4 ms·

Stop visiting sites and using services that use reCAPTCHA. Problem solved. No. Bigger problem created, since there are innumerable government, health care, an

Stop visiting sites and using services that use reCAPTCHA. Problem solved. No. Bigger problem created, since there are innumerable government, health care, and educational web sites that use reCAPTCHA. I'm not going to give up reading the test results from my doctor because of some simplistic ideologue decides that it's "problem solved."

unethical_ban 6mo ago
I agree, and I think CAPTCHA is a disservice on public websites.
majorchord 6mo ago
> I'm not going to give up reading the test results from my doctor You could just call them.
- andwur 6mo ago
  Oh just wait, the AI phone service on their side will be more than happy to complete your device attestation key challenge by touch tone. We have to make sure you are still you after all! But in all seriousness, many services are making it difficult through to impossible to communicate outside of their web or app platforms. Call centres are expensive and messy, and it's now apparently acceptable as a society to treat customers/clients/whatever as adversaries so they can get away with making it hard to communicate with them.
  - petre 6mo ago
    I was unable to book a doctors meeting through the clinic's website, so I declared "screw tech" and called their call center, which still worked better. The app just searched for the "first available spot" and never found anything. If they axe the call center I'm going to have to go to their place.
- getpokedagain 6mo ago
  Or ask for a print out.
- scbrg 6mo ago
  Fairly sure that would be considered a breach of patient confidentiality where I live, at least.
  - majorchord 6mo ago
    Sorry to hear that. What did people do before computers then?
    - scbrg 6mo ago
      Not sure how that's relevant. There are computers now. Regulations change with the times. Green lasers weren't controlled in the 1700:s either. Are you comfortable with anybody being able to ring up the hospital and say "yo, it's majorchord, how are my gonnorhea results?"
      - majorchord 6mo ago
        > Are you comfortable with anybody being able to ring up the hospital and say "yo, it's majorchord, how are my gonnorhea results?" No, that's why we have safety protocols in place. When you call a doctor they ask you for your birthdate or sometimes also a PIN/password on your account to protect your data. How would that still be considered a breach of privacy?
        scbrg 6mo ago
        Alright. I didn't know that. "Just call them" did not sound like it included any kind of authentication procedure. But giving birthdate (available to anyone via a single query in a public database) and (sometimes?! - what?!) PIN over the phone wouldn't really be considered good enough here. Birthdate is, as I said, public knowledge. And a phone is too insecure a medium for transmitting a password. I'm not super interested in an long argument about whether it's reasonable that this isn't considered secure or not. I'm just letting you know what reality looks like. And the reality is that "just call them" is not a solution, because such information will simply not be handed out over the phone.
- account42 6mo ago
  That misses the point: alternatives will only be available as long as enough people uses them.
  - ranger_danger 6mo ago
    I still make and receive calls all the time to get test results from my doctor, I think tons of people still use that option.
ethin 6mo ago
The other problem with this is that there are few CAPTCHA alternatives. CF turnstile is one, but of course that means Cloudflare owns even more of the web. HCaptcha is inaccessible and actively discriminatory against individuals with disabilities and refuses to change, to the point that I suspect the only way that they will do anything is to file a class-action against them and sue them into the ground. And I... Can't think of anything else. Other than to just get rid of Captchas entirely.
- ribtoks 6mo ago
  There are other captcha alternatives like Turnstile, for example Private Captcha, Altcha etc. - they are owned by mostly “small” independent companies, they are not visual captchas (proof-of-work based) and very accesssible.
- userbinator 6mo ago
  You could just have a custom one that asks domain-specific questions (and ones which will trip up LLMs are not hard to come by.) I've seen a few forums ask such questions for registration, long before the rise of LLMs.
- fireflash38 6mo ago
  The answer that no one likes: make it cost a nominal amount of money. Enough to make it so bots are expensive to run.
yehat 6mo ago
Compliance is what makes all that shit possible. Sadly most people are compliant and made so by gradually increasing their dependency on "commodities" which really are anchors to a shit lake.
- JKCalhoun 6mo ago
  Beautiful analogy, BTW. Suddenly I have been made aware that, having lost my paddle on Shit Creek, I will eventually be taken downstream to Shit Lake (where it appears I will inevitably drop anchor).
Roark66 6mo ago
At least in my country (Poland) you should be able to make a pretty bug fuss and resulting in them fixing it, if indeed one of ego services made you leak all your data to Google. People do care about such things. I hope the same is true in other EU countries.

unethical_ban 6mo ago

I agree, and I think CAPTCHA is a disservice on public websites.

majorchord 6mo ago

> I'm not going to give up reading the test results from my doctor You could just call them.

andwur 6mo ago
Oh just wait, the AI phone service on their side will be more than happy to complete your device attestation key challenge by touch tone. We have to make sure you are still you after all! But in all seriousness, many services are making it difficult through to impossible to communicate outside of their web or app platforms. Call centres are expensive and messy, and it's now apparently acceptable as a society to treat customers/clients/whatever as adversaries so they can get away with making it hard to communicate with them.
- petre 6mo ago
  I was unable to book a doctors meeting through the clinic's website, so I declared "screw tech" and called their call center, which still worked better. The app just searched for the "first available spot" and never found anything. If they axe the call center I'm going to have to go to their place.
getpokedagain 6mo ago
Or ask for a print out.
scbrg 6mo ago
Fairly sure that would be considered a breach of patient confidentiality where I live, at least.
- majorchord 6mo ago
  Sorry to hear that. What did people do before computers then?
  - scbrg 6mo ago
    Not sure how that's relevant. There are computers now. Regulations change with the times. Green lasers weren't controlled in the 1700:s either. Are you comfortable with anybody being able to ring up the hospital and say "yo, it's majorchord, how are my gonnorhea results?"
    - majorchord 6mo ago
      > Are you comfortable with anybody being able to ring up the hospital and say "yo, it's majorchord, how are my gonnorhea results?" No, that's why we have safety protocols in place. When you call a doctor they ask you for your birthdate or sometimes also a PIN/password on your account to protect your data. How would that still be considered a breach of privacy?
      - scbrg 6mo ago
        Alright. I didn't know that. "Just call them" did not sound like it included any kind of authentication procedure. But giving birthdate (available to anyone via a single query in a public database) and (sometimes?! - what?!) PIN over the phone wouldn't really be considered good enough here. Birthdate is, as I said, public knowledge. And a phone is too insecure a medium for transmitting a password. I'm not super interested in an long argument about whether it's reasonable that this isn't considered secure or not. I'm just letting you know what reality looks like. And the reality is that "just call them" is not a solution, because such information will simply not be handed out over the phone.
account42 6mo ago
That misses the point: alternatives will only be available as long as enough people uses them.
- ranger_danger 6mo ago
  I still make and receive calls all the time to get test results from my doctor, I think tons of people still use that option.

ethin 6mo ago

The other problem with this is that there are few CAPTCHA alternatives. CF turnstile is one, but of course that means Cloudflare owns even more of the web. HCaptcha is inaccessible and actively discriminatory against individuals with disabilities and refuses to change, to the point that I suspect the only way that they will do anything is to file a class-action against them and sue them into the ground. And I... Can't think of anything else. Other than to just get rid of Captchas entirely.

ribtoks 6mo ago
There are other captcha alternatives like Turnstile, for example Private Captcha, Altcha etc. - they are owned by mostly “small” independent companies, they are not visual captchas (proof-of-work based) and very accesssible.
userbinator 6mo ago
You could just have a custom one that asks domain-specific questions (and ones which will trip up LLMs are not hard to come by.) I've seen a few forums ask such questions for registration, long before the rise of LLMs.
fireflash38 6mo ago
The answer that no one likes: make it cost a nominal amount of money. Enough to make it so bots are expensive to run.

yehat 6mo ago

Compliance is what makes all that shit possible. Sadly most people are compliant and made so by gradually increasing their dependency on "commodities" which really are anchors to a shit lake.

JKCalhoun 6mo ago
Beautiful analogy, BTW. Suddenly I have been made aware that, having lost my paddle on Shit Creek, I will eventually be taken downstream to Shit Lake (where it appears I will inevitably drop anchor).

Roark66 6mo ago

At least in my country (Poland) you should be able to make a pretty bug fuss and resulting in them fixing it, if indeed one of ego services made you leak all your data to Google. People do care about such things. I hope the same is true in other EU countries.