"Saw your new location post! Studios like yours qualify for up to $60,000 by Friday. Want me to send the numbers?"
Priya had hung up on that broker at 4:10 PM on Monday. At 8:02 AM on Tuesday, the same pitch sat in her LinkedIn inbox as an InMail. By 9:15 AM, a near copy was waiting in the Instagram requests for her studio's business account.
No phone rang. Her call screener never saw a thing.
Part 33 of Stop the Calls covers the DM lockdown: one written line, one report, and four settings across LinkedIn and Instagram.
General information, not legal advice. Priya, the broker and Harborline Pilates, Priya's studio, are made up.
Why brokers show up in DMs
Your LinkedIn profile lists your name, your title and your shop in public. Your Instagram business account shows your location and every post.
Call screening (Part 5) guards your number. A DM lives inside the app, so the fix does too. (Part 32 handled WhatsApp.)
The tactic: the DM lockdown
Screenshot the DM, with the profile name and time.
Paste one stop line, word for word:
"Please stop contacting me and Harborline Pilates on LinkedIn, Instagram or any other channel, including calls, texts and email. Take us off your lists and don't pass our details to anyone. Consider this my written request."
Report, then block. On LinkedIn, open the conversation, click the More icon and choose Report this conversation. LinkedIn says the sender isn't told who reported them, the conversation leaves your inbox, and you can block afterward (LinkedIn Help). On Instagram, a reported spam message goes to Instagram's team for review, and the account won't see who reported it (Instagram Help Center).
Turn off InMail. In LinkedIn, open Settings & Privacy, then Data privacy, then Messages under Who can reach you. Switch the InMail toggle (Allow others to send you InMail) to No (LinkedIn Help). This can't stop 1st-degree connections, so a broker who connected first gets a block.
Decide on your Page's Message button. A LinkedIn Page admin can go to Inbox, then More, then Inbox settings, and switch off the Message button toggle. Members can still reply in old threads (LinkedIn Help). If customers book through it, keep it.
Filter Instagram requests. Under How others can interact with you, open Messages and story replies, then Message controls. Send requests from people you don't follow to Message Requests, or don't receive them at all (Instagram Help Center). Then open Hidden Words, turn on Hide unwanted message requests (off by default), and add custom words: "funding, pre-approved, working capital, advance." Matching requests drop into a Spam folder with no notification (Instagram Help Center). Do this in the app, not a web browser.
Log it in the call log template, with the app name as the channel.
The broker answered once: "Totally understand! I'll check back next quarter." Priya didn't reply. All four settings took her about 6 minutes.
AI assist: paste your old broker messages into any AI chat and ask for the 10 words they repeat most. That's your Hidden Words list.
What the rules do and don't cover here
An FCC clock built for phones. Federal rules give callers no more than 10 business days to honor a stop request made in any reasonable way (47 CFR 64.1200(a)(10)). That text speaks to calls and texts, not app DMs, so the app's own tools carry this one.
App policy, not law. LinkedIn says it doesn't tolerate spam messages or scams under its Professional Community Policies (LinkedIn Help). Reporting puts the sender in front of that policy.
The registry gap. Business lines are not covered by the National Do Not Call Registry at all, because it protects personal numbers (FTC, 47 CFR 64.1200(c)(2)). The FTC's Telemarketing Sales Rule exempts most business-to-business calls (16 CFR 310.6), and 47 U.S.C. 227 turns on the line and the dialing method.
A DM asking for a bank login or upfront fee is a different problem: see Part 25 and ReportFraud.FTC.gov. To keep your real number off public pages, see Part 18.
Nothing here promises an outcome. For more, browse Know Your Rights, the MCAFax toolkit, the broker-calls guide and every part on the series hub.
Your checklist
- Screenshot the DM first.
- Paste the stop line once.
- Report the conversation, then block.
- Set LinkedIn InMail to No.
- Keep or kill your Page's Message button.
- Turn on Instagram's request filter and custom words.
- Log it with the app as the channel.
Coming in Part 34: the broker who fills out your website's contact form, and how to stop that form feeding lead lists.
