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I was previously using a VPN and that seemed to increase my exposure to reCaptcha but I've noticed that even without the VPN enabled there seems to be far more services using these as validation when logging users in.
Has you noticed an increase in these reCaptcha challenges and if so, is there a particular reason for this?
My instinct is that it was a result of running Linux as it is likely the majority of spam requests come from Linux servers whereas the majority of legitimate requests come from Windows computers. It makes sense that anti-spam systems would take this into account. To fix this I changed my browser fingerprint to tell websites I was running Windows. I have no data to prove it, but I feel as though this has reduced the number of CAPTCHAs I've had to complete.
Also, it is possible websites are increasing their anti-spam measures as a result of the alleged Russian interference in the politics of western countries using bot/spam accounts.
My final theory is that someone is paying them a lot of money for the data they collect for use in training their self-driving vehicle AI. In this case they would want to show you CAPTCHAs more frequently to collect more data to sell for more profit.
I've actually found myself switching loyalty and booking Marriot properties rather than Hilton for business travel because the reCaptcha makes it such a PITA to book anything on Hilton's site.
It used to be bearable. Now I have to go through multiple series of challenges often, sometimes many times.
I'd take a computational challenge over spending a minute selecting images any day.
Edit: Sometimes it's so bad that I get the impression that a site is a scam attempting to get me to fill out reCAPTCHAs so bots can use them.
Yes. My instinct is that it was a result of running Linux as it is likely the majority of spam requests come from Linux servers whereas the majority of legitimate requests come from Windows computers. It makes sense that anti-spam systems would take this into account. To fix this I changed my browser fingerprint to tell websites I was running Windows. I have no data to prove it, but I feel as though this has reduced…
I don't believe this to be true because I use Windows often.
I don't use a VPN and I've been observing this increase for some time now. I do not know why, but I believe they are probably training a new model or something.
I'd also like to add, if any Google engineer involved in the reCAPTCHA project is reading this, that I'd be pretty amused if you stepped on a lego piece or bumped your tiny toe against something hard.
Yes, I am that mad. My UX on the web has declined drastically thanks to you.
Not only are the images hard to understand - some of them are purposefully grainy! - I take a long time to do what I need to do on certain websites.
I thoroughly dislike you.
Yes. My instinct is that it was a result of running Linux as it is likely the majority of spam requests come from Linux servers whereas the majority of legitimate requests come from Windows computers. It makes sense that anti-spam systems would take this into account. To fix this I changed my browser fingerprint to tell websites I was running Windows. I have no data to prove it, but I feel as though this has reduced…
That's an interesting thought. I hadn't really thought about it being a training set for self-driving AI but that would make sense given that all examples are from Google Street View nowadays.