Cyber crimes are becoming increasingly common and, with each one, scammers get better at tricking you into giving away your personal information.
Federal officials have warned of a wave of phony text messages claiming someone owes tolls, has overdue legal fines or have undelivered packages. The goal of these messages is to get someone to click on a link or return a phone call in an attempt to steal passwords or other personal information.
The best advice from Apple and other tech experts is to always delete these messages immediately. And now, a new feature in Apple’s Messages app in iOS 26 could help keep you safe from phony text messages and other “smishing” attempts.
9to5Mac reported the new iPhone Messages app divides conversations into categories: Messages, Unknown Senders, Spam and Recently Deleted. The various types of messages are handled differently by the app with “Messages” view showing regular conversations with contacts, verification codes and reservation confirmations, the tech website explained. You won’t get a notification for “Unknown Senders” and “Spam,” though you can manually turn on or off filtering for both categories.
The real advancement comes in two new restrictions on messages in the “Spam” folder. Any links contained in Spam messages will be disabled, meaning you won’t be able to easily tap on them for access. According to the Federal Trade Commission, fake links in messages are a common – and far too often successful – tool used by scammers with some $470 million lost in 2023 due to scams that started with a text message.
The other safeguard is a new feature that prevents someone from replying to messages in the Spam folder. You can reply if you move the message back to Main but the extra step makes it less likely you respond to a scammer.
Even with those safeguards in place, the FTC recommends people remain vigilant to texting scams.
Here are their recommendations:
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