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Thread: Re: I hate captchas *
Number of posts in this thread: 5 (In chronological order)
From: tedd
Date: Tue, Mar 13 2007 9:20AM
Subject: Re: I hate captchas *
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At 12:09 PM -0400 3/13/07, John E. Brandt wrote:
>I'm not sure captchas even do what they are supposed to do.
>
>I was using phpBB on one of my servers and despite the captcha element, I
>was getting spam-bots by the dozen each day. It just got worse and worse so
>I took the phpBB offline.
>
>It sounds like we need a new method.
>
>~j
>
>John E. Brandt
>Augusta, Maine USA
>www.jebswebs.com
John:
What kind of CAPTCHA were you using?
tedd
--
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http://sperling.com http://ancientstones.com http://earthstones.com
From: John E. Brandt
Date: Tue, Mar 13 2007 9:30AM
Subject: Re: I hate captchas
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I'm not sure captchas even do what they are supposed to do.
I was using phpBB on one of my servers and despite the captcha element, I
was getting spam-bots by the dozen each day. It just got worse and worse so
I took the phpBB offline.
It sounds like we need a new method.
~j
John E. Brandt
Augusta, Maine USA
www.jebswebs.com
-----Original Message-----
From: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
[mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ] On Behalf Of Penny Roberts
Sent: Tuesday, March 13, 2007 5:48 AM
To: WebAIM Discussion List
Subject: [WebAIM] I hate captchas
I know that you know this: no need to reply. I just need to share...
<vent>
I hate chaptchas. Four times over the weekend (on completely different
sites) I had to use the damn things and *every *single *time* I got it wrong
at the first attempt. One was so unclear that I asked Kev to take a look
and between us we agreed what the character was. Ha! we were both wrong.
One of them was particularly galling because it was at the bottom of
a form. One of the firlds on the form was a date and it had a handy dandy
JavaScript date picker... which told me that I didn't have authority to use
it! So I had to type the date in manually but there was no clue as to the
format they required. So I took a guess and got it wrong... twice (so three
attempts). And each time the B!@@%y captcha changed!
</vent>
Thank you for your time,
Penny
From: Emma Duke-Williams
Date: Tue, Mar 13 2007 9:40AM
Subject: Re: I hate captchas *
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On 3/13/07, tedd < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> At 12:09 PM -0400 3/13/07, John E. Brandt wrote:
> >I was using phpBB on one of my servers and despite the captcha element, I
> >was getting spam-bots by the dozen each day. It just got worse and worse so
> >I took the phpBB offline.
> >It sounds like we need a new method.
> John:
>
> What kind of CAPTCHA were you using?
>
> tedd
There's also the possiblity that the "spam bot" is, in fact, a human
spammer: http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/09/06/1217240
Emma
--
Blog: http://www.tech.port.ac.uk/staffweb/duke-wie/blog/
From: tedd
Date: Tue, Mar 13 2007 10:20AM
Subject: Re: I hate captchas *
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At 4:25 PM +0000 3/13/07, Emma Duke-Williams wrote:
>On 3/13/07, tedd < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
>> At 12:09 PM -0400 3/13/07, John E. Brandt wrote:
>> >I was using phpBB on one of my servers and despite the captcha element, I
>> >was getting spam-bots by the dozen each day. It just got worse and worse so
>> >I took the phpBB offline.
>> >It sounds like we need a new method.
>> John:
>>
>> What kind of CAPTCHA were you using?
>>
>> tedd
>There's also the possiblity that the "spam bot" is, in fact, a human
>spammer: http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/09/06/1217240
>
>Emma
Emma:
Of course there's always flaws in everything. But, on the bright
side, when a large portion of rest of the world is in poverty, this
is work for them. I find the ebb and flow of things always
interesting.
However, I'm not sure as to how they would fit in. Are they the ones
who inject spam into blogs? Clearly, they can't just report back "I
got into this blog by typing <whatever>" because "keys" change,
right? So, they must have some participation in spamming.
I do have a scheme for deterring spam, but need funding. I can build
a better mousetrap, but I'm reluctant to provide it for free. I guess
we all need work.
Cheers,
tedd
--
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http://sperling.com http://ancientstones.com http://earthstones.com
From: John Middleton
Date: Tue, Mar 13 2007 2:30PM
Subject: Re: I hate captchas
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tedd wrote:
> At 12:09 PM -0400 3/13/07, John E. Brandt wrote:
>
>> I'm not sure captchas even do what they are supposed to do.
>>
>> I was using phpBB on one of my servers and despite the captcha element, I
>> was getting spam-bots by the dozen each day. It just got worse and worse so
>> I took the phpBB offline.
>>
>> It sounds like we need a new method.
>>
>> ~j
>>
>> John E. Brandt
>> Augusta, Maine USA
>> www.jebswebs.com
>>
>
> John:
>
> What kind of CAPTCHA were you using?
>
> tedd
>
---
Greetings WebAim,
I also do not accept most CAPTCHA processes as an accessible solution,
rather most often a hindrance.
Spam-bots have gotten so bad with online forms, I've had to create a
custom solution script. Although this may present some cognitive
difficulties for some, I hope it's a minimal accessibility issue.
Considering the nuisance of maintaining online Web forms and hi-jacking
attempts, this was the best I could come up with, without simply linking
encoded e-mail links. If you are savy with PERL and Server Side
Includes, I'll gladly share my cgi source code.
I simply validate the form using a simple random math question (eg.
Enter the sum of 2 and 1).
Example page: http://www.ncddr.org/webforms/feedback.html
I'll be lurking for comments and accessibility theories.
Regards,
John Middleton
NCDDR Web Administrator