{
  "id": 3250994,
  "title": "South Africans fight back as spam calls surge past 17bn",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/25/south-africans-fight-back-as-spam-calls-surge-past-17bn",
  "topic": "world",
  "section": "World",
  "published": "2026-08-25T11:23:41.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Mail and Guardian",
    "slug": "mail-and-guardian",
    "url": "https://mg.co.za/partner-content/2026-08-25-south-africans-fight-back-as-spam-calls-surge-past-17bn/"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": null,
  "summary": "Despite a massive surge in AI-driven scam calls exceeding 17 billion in South Africa, citizens are fighting back by answering fewer unknown numbers as new regulations and opt-out registries loom.",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}