[Njtechdiv] Google Has Finally Killed the CAPTCHA

[Mario Brusco]

this article from the Top Tech Tidbits newsletter from Flying Blind, I 
think warrants mention because it is a big deal for us blind computer 
users, but bear in mind that it is a current achievement and is probably 
not widely accepted yet.


Google Has Finally Killed the CAPTCHA
http://gizmodo.com/google-has-finally-killed-the-captcha-1793190374

Rhett Jones
Saturday 5:47pm
Filed to: Captcha Death

CAPTCHA's are an irritating but necessary evil. The system that is used 
to verify whether or not a user is human has been around a while and it 
had to evolve because machines were getting better at reading the text 
than humans. With its latest iteration, Google says you'll no longer 
have to input anything at all.

Invisible CAPTCHA's are the latest development in the "Completely 
Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart." Google 
acquired reCaptcha back in 2009.
It updated the system in 2013 to allow for the ubiquitous "I'm not a 
robot" checkbox that's all over the internet. That version worked by 
determining the user's humanity through their clicking style. If the 
click seemed fishy, a more elaborate test would be offered. But the 
Invisible CAPTCHA is able to recognize that a user is not a bot simply 
by analyzing their browsing behavior.

In a video, the company explained "Powering these advances is a 
combination of machine learning and advanced risk analysis that adapt to 
new and emerging threats." But what's in it for Google?

When the search giant initially bought reCaptcha it was actually for the 
purpose of integrating it into its giant book scanning project. The 
technology was great for digitizing books that were illegible to 
Google's transcription system. But its unclear what Google gains by 
continuing to improve the software.

  Shuman Ghosemajumder, a former Google employee tells Popular Science, 
"Google in general-and this is certainly a philosophy that we adhered to 
when I was there-believed that anything that is good for the internet, 
is good for Google." In this case, a "more frictionless" internet is 
good for everybody. But don't count out the possibility that Google is 
improving its machine learning capabilities through your behaviors. And 
Ghosemajumder points out that Google knows about the past behavior of 
users when they're logged in, which
would make the system more accurate. That could be a small incentive for 
some people to ensure they log in.