Cellular communications are dying in Russia. Russians have lost their desire to communicate by voice

Russians are increasingly less likely to answer the phone when they receive calls from unknown numbers. Every sixth resident of the country does this, and every second does not answer a call from a hidden number. Fraudsters have developed this habit in them over the past few years, terrorizing citizens. Meanwhile, operators offer customizable tariffs with a minimum of prepaid minutes and unlimited messengers.

Unanswered call

In modern Russia, there are fewer and fewer people who still regularly answer calls from numbers they don’t know. As representatives of the job search service SuperJob told CNews, only less than 3 out of 10 Russians pick up the phone (29%) if they don’t know who is calling them.

Approximately every second citizen of the country in such a situation answers the call only occasionally – by inertia or if they are currently waiting for a call, for example, from an ad. This is the answer given by 55% of the participants in the survey, which was conducted among 1,600 Russians over 18 years old in 369 settlements of the country from August 30 to September 2, 2024.

Every sixth Russian (16% of respondents) does not answer a call from an unknown number at all. Such people justify their reluctance to pick up the phone by the fact that there are too many scammers in the country.

Wisdom comes with age

SuperJob statistics show that the older a Russian is, the less often he or she answers suspicious calls from numbers that are not in their contact list. Among Russians under 34, those who always answer such calls account for 33%, in the 35-44 age group there were only 27% of such people, and only 26% of Russians aged 45 and older are ready to talk to an unknown interlocutor. In the same age categories, those who never answer such calls account for 13%, 17% and 18%, respectively.

It is noteworthy that men are more inclined to spend their time communicating with a caller from an unknown number. 36% of men always answer such calls, and only 14% never pick up the phone. Among women, the figures are different – 27% and 17%.

Does it all depend on salary?

SuperJob experts also found that the higher a Russian’s salary, the more willingly they are to communicate with an unknown interlocutor. With a high degree of probability, 19% of those earning up to 50 thousand rubles and 36% of those whose income starts from 100 thousand rubles will answer a call from an unknown number.

Do you answer calls on your personal mobile phone from unknown numbers?

“Those who earn more often have the opportunity to connect to the “anti-spam” service,” SuperJob representatives told CNews. But it is important to emphasize that in Russia there are many free applications that warn about fraudulent calls – even the standard Google “dialer”, which is available in almost any modern Android smartphone, has such a function. In addition, some large Russian telecom operators offer the service of protection against spammers and fraudsters for free.

When the alternative is too obvious

Modern smartphones can automatically reject incoming calls from unknown and hidden numbers. And modern messengers make it possible to never make voice calls over cellular networks – each of them, with rare exceptions, has audio and video call functions.

Telecom operators are also pushing Russians to abandon calls via cellular networks in favor of audio calls, which also work in Wi-Fi networks. Each of them now has customizable tariffs, in which you can reduce the number of minutes and thereby reduce the subscription fee. They also offer, for a minimal additional fee, to activate unlimited traffic in messengers, which will open up the possibility of video communication in 24/7/365 mode.

The CNews editorial team contacted MTS, Tele2 and MegaFon with a question about the dynamics of the popularity of voice calls via cellular networks among Russians over the past few years and is awaiting a response.