CAPTCHA

You've noticed spam on the internet flooding from bots at some point or another, right? It's estimated that 99.9999% of all email is spam. How did it get this way? It's thanks to a little thing called the CAPTCHA.

In the old days, websites had intelligent limits based on IP addresses and heuristics and all that. Now, they just use CAPTCHAs. For what reason? GodJesus only knows because they're not stopping the spambots. FACT: No human has ever gotten past a CAPTCHA, ever, not once. Eventually the human just gives up, goes to The Pirate Bay, downloads XRumer, and has that program solve the CAPTCHA for them.

Types of CAPTCHAs

ReCAPTCHA (and how to fuck it up)

reCAPTCHA holds the potential for unmitigated lulz. Last Thursday, some geek decided it would be a fabulous idea to turn CAPTCHA into a method of obtaining nigger labor. Here's how it works; lots of people and companies want to scan books, but computers aren't very good at reading text, especially old shitty, blurry, text. They could hire people to read the words the computer can't, but are far too busy guarding their joo golds. Instead, they've decided that relying on the drunken, mischevious, volatile hordes of internet users is a good idea.

Look for these

Unlike a regular CAPTCHA, reCAPTCHA's have two words, and that logo you see over there. One word is a regular CAPTCHA, the other (usually the second) is a word scanned from a book[1]. You have to get the CAPTCHA right, but since the computer has no idea what the fuck that other word is, you can type anything you want there. Some helpful suggestions: fag, goatse, nigger (extra points if it's someone's name or an adjective), lolwut, longcat, goatse, etc... For all the computer knows, it really says that and it's stupid enough to take your word for it. You don't get to see the result of this yourself, but you do get the satisfaction of knowing that someone out there is reading an ebook about how Sherlock Goatse raeped Professor McNiggertits with his pointy porksword.

In the original reCAPTCHA it was easy to tell which word is the scan and which is the CAPTCHA, the scan would be clear and have a line through it while the CAPTCHA would be wavy. Thanks to massive trolling to protest CAPTCHAs they've changed it a little; now both words look mostly alike but the discerning troll can still tell the difference. The scan usually has slightly blurrier edges, and is usually an old and/or weird word, a name, or verbose math terms with symbols. In the example above, the scan is the first word.

Recently, Google has begun replacing the CAPTCHA words with bizarre letter combinations that vaguely resemble words, but aren't really words. In fact, you can almost guarantee that if you see an actual word, it's the book word, not the CAPTCHA.

PROTIP: These are disappearing in favor of the brain-raping version three detailed below, fill in as many of these as you can while you still can.

Math CAPTCHA

When CAPTCHAs fail, bullshit prevails.

Your standard math CAPTCHA. Can you solve it? The answer is 0 (zero).

Ordinary CAPTCHAs

• 
  Your common MySpace CAPTCHA.
• 
  A friendly, welcoming CAPTCHA.
• 
  A typical Free Republic CAPTCHA.
• 
  Seen during Google signup.
• 
  Captcha-tan.
• 
  If all else fails...
• 
  Captcha speaks the truth
• Typical Megaupload CAPTCHA
  Typical Megaupload CAPTCHA
• Lolz
  Lolz
• ͪ̒͑͏̜͓̲̥̹͙͖̝̟̘̦͇̺̮́
  ͪ̒͑͏̜͓̲̥̹͙͖̝̟̘̦͇̺̮́
• New York Yankees edition
  New York Yankees edition
• How did they know?
  How did they know?
• 
  castrate
• Now in your favorite language.
  Now in your favorite language.
• Some examples of ReCAPTCHAs that worked.
  Some examples of ReCAPTCHAs that worked.
• 
  JEWS DID CAPTCHA

Wikis

Wikipedia and Wikia both use CAPTCHAs for registration to prevent vandalism. This actually works because most vandals (as opposed to Grawp) are too lazy to download a software to read the CAPTCHAs.

On some sites, every single step you make requires solving a CAPTCHA

MySpace is the typical example:

• Changing their password
• Registering a new account
• Sending comments
• Friend requests
• Logging in, even if the password is typed correctly.
• Modifying profiles
• Sending someone a message
• Calling 911
• Every time you click a page no matter what

...but if you have a cell phone, you can text MySpace so you no longer have to do CAPTCHAs.

On eBay, you have to solve a CAPTCHA to send yourself a test message and sometimes even to view your own feedback profile if you're logged in. It also has CAPTCHAs all over its website, and sometimes these are broken for days, rejecting all correct answers.

reCaptcha on /b/

Recently, moot finally got sick and tired of all the spam that had been recently "Engulfing the whole site". The spam purportedly came from Mathew Pelligrino of Facebook, who took revenge upon /b/ for their emailing of his cam whore sister's tits to their father. At least that what is said on his Face Book page (personalarmyfag detected. Reaction from /b/tards was split as usual, and /b/ was actually spam-free for the first time in history. Some random people in an IRC channel with a homebuilt spamming script and a huge list of proxies, posting VALVe video game characters.

/b/tards are spamming reCaptcha with the word nigger, they call it Operation Ebook

• 1. ask for an audio clip
• 2. type in "nigger nigger nigger nigger nigger nigger nigger nigger nigger nigger"
• 3. Bypass captcha
• 4.???
• 5.PROFIT!!!

UPDATE: Spam is, indeed, back.

External links

• Microsoft stole KittenAuth, renamed it and claimed it as their own.
• How reCAPTCHA works and how to mess with it!
• Math CAPTCHA
• Art inspired by Captcha