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Captchas are Becoming Ridiculous

andrewmunsell.com

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Re: Captchas are Becoming Ridiculous

#151

Post by shadowfox »

Rylinks wrote: post #85
ademarre wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If enough people colluded to use the same unknown word, say "foobar", then couldn't they train recaptcha to believe that is the true value of the word? If I understand recaptcha correctly, and assuming they don't detect collusion well, then eventually the known word pool would get poisoned with a surplus of foobars.

An engineer said they have defenses against this >Checking for offensive words is only one of the filters we have. Even without that filter, it’s essentially impossible to get recaptcha to return a false result. http://musicmachinery.com/2009/04/27/moot-wins-time-inc-lose...

> it’s essentially impossible to get recaptcha to return a false result.

Famous last words :P

Re: Captchas are Becoming Ridiculous

#153

Post by hueving »

vitd wrote: post #103
Alupis wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've solved a lot of captcha's in my time, and really have never experienced the trouble the author is detailing. Not only am I relieved when I see a reCaptcha since they are some of the easiest and most forgiving challenges, but I don't recall ever having repeated bad/unsolvable challenges presented on the same page. Sure, maybe sometimes you get a weird one and fail it. But typically the next challenge is easy to p…

>Besides this -- the article makes no attempt to offer a better solution. That's completely irrelevant. Criticism is not about solving the problem. It's about pointing out that the current solution is inadequate. Most movie critics never wrote, directed, or acted in movies. It doesn't invalidate their criticism. In fact, your criticism of the other poster's criticism doesn't offer a better solution than criticism eit…

>That's completely irrelevant. Criticism is not about solving the problem. It's about pointing out that the current solution is inadequate.

Well it's a pointless criticism when everyone knows CAPTCHAs suck. People have spent a lot of time working on them trying to find better ones that work consistently at scale and have failed.

It's similar to someone now writing a criticism on the testing procedures at the Chernobyl nuclear power plan.

Re: Captchas are Becoming Ridiculous

#154

Post by hueving »

Perdition wrote: post #141
mgkimsal wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How the hell is anyone "to realize that only one word needs to be entered" when that's not what the instructions say to do?

Experience with reCaptcha. I can totally understand why those would frustrate non-technical users, but on a site like HN I would expect people to know how reCaptcha works. That said I think reCaptcha has been getting much harder recently due to the arms race with bots. I now sometimes fail 3-4 times in a row.

>I would expect people to know how reCaptcha works.

Why should you even expect that? Recaptcha was interesting in 2006, but anyone not following the news around that time or around the its acquisition by Google might not have learned this.

Re: Captchas are Becoming Ridiculous

#155

Post by hueving »

_ofdw wrote: post #127
ademarre wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If enough people colluded to use the same unknown word, say "foobar", then couldn't they train recaptcha to believe that is the true value of the word? If I understand recaptcha correctly, and assuming they don't detect collusion well, then eventually the known word pool would get poisoned with a surplus of foobars.

Some 4channers tried that already. You can guess which 6-letter epithet for black people they tried to use.

>You can guess which 6-letter epithet for black people they tried to use.

'Blacks'

Re: Captchas are Becoming Ridiculous

#156

Post by hueving »

Pinckney wrote: post #116
mrjatx wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After I've filled out 20 different forms the last thing I want to do is deal with a completely illegible captcha which might go far as to refresh the entire page or wipe out what I've entered in certain fields (password, ssn, etc) each time I get it wrong. That's one way to push me away from signing up for your service.

That's not really a problem with recaptcha so much as the integration with the rest of the site.

Well then you obviously understand some websites have problems with this, so why would a user risk losing all of their filled out data?

Re: Captchas are Becoming Ridiculous

#157

Post by sumedh »

Larrikin wrote: post #129
brianbreslin wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are free labor

It was one thing when they were digitizing books. I refuse to help them improve Google Maps. I have never correctly entered in a map number. As long as you're only off by one digit they are accepting

> I refuse to help them improve Google Maps. I have never correctly entered in a map number.

So why don't you stop using Google products if you hate it so much?

Re: Captchas are Becoming Ridiculous

#158

Post by baddox »

mgkimsal wrote: post #137
mzd348 wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Try solving these actual examples: First one: a rhaval Second one: a onsupsel You need to realize that only one word needs to be entered. For the other word just enter any string (or even no string works in some/all cases).

How the hell is anyone "to realize that only one word needs to be entered" when that's not what the instructions say to do?

You don't have to preemptively realize it. You just have to try it. Like he said, literally anything you type for the unrecognizable word will work.

Re: Captchas are Becoming Ridiculous

#159

Post by Washuu »

Alupis wrote: post #58
sp332 wrote: post #3

The squished-up word is the control word, and the straight one is the unknown one. You only need to get the wavy word right and just guess at all the cut-off examples.

I've solved a lot of captcha's in my time, and really have never experienced the trouble the author is detailing. Not only am I relieved when I see a reCaptcha since they are some of the easiest and most forgiving challenges, but I don't recall ever having repeated bad/unsolvable challenges presented on the same page. Sure, maybe sometimes you get a weird one and fail it. But typically the next challenge is easy to p…

In the past month the reCAPTCHA challenges I have encountered have been like the article. I just have to hit reload until I can get something remotely readable or I managed to guess the letters correctly.

Re: Captchas are Becoming Ridiculous

#160

Post by aryehof »

Washuu wrote: post #159
Alupis wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've solved a lot of captcha's in my time, and really have never experienced the trouble the author is detailing. Not only am I relieved when I see a reCaptcha since they are some of the easiest and most forgiving challenges, but I don't recall ever having repeated bad/unsolvable challenges presented on the same page. Sure, maybe sometimes you get a weird one and fail it. But typically the next challenge is easy to p…

In the past month the reCAPTCHA challenges I have encountered have been like the article. I just have to hit reload until I can get something remotely readable or I managed to guess the letters correctly.

This is exactly my experience too. I find myself having to hit reload increasingly to get something readable.
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