'Net Features : captcha

7 Innovative Solutions to CAPTCHA User Attention

Michael Garrity — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 19:35:00 GMT

Security is one of the most important factors that a webmaster or developer has to take into consideration when designing a website – especially one that handles sensitive user data and/or requires users to register before they can begin to interact with the site.

Among the many solutions that Web workers have devised to improve security measures, as well as the user experience on their sites, is the CAPTCHA (or Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart – I think it’s a good idea they decided to use the acronym), a solution that presents a challenge response test to users that ensures the “person” trying to access the site is actually a human, and not just an annoying spam bot.

Unfortunately, while these solutions can be useful in theory, they are often more problematic when they’re actually implemented. Not only can they be cumbersome, difficult to read and a generally unwanted hassle for users, but they’re not even foolproof, as bots can use optical character recognition (OCR) software to crack the CAPTCHA code.

As a result, developers have had to get creative with their CAPTCHAs, resulting in an improved experience for many users. Here are six of the more interesting, innovative and just plain useful CAPTCHA solutions available today:

reCAPTCHA

Although reCAPTCHA looks a lot like traditional CAPTCHA solutions (because it is), it’s also a service that helps digitize books, newspapers and even old radio shows. Basically, as reCAPTCHA goes about the process of putting this old content into a sleep new digital format, it will go through and find those words that are pretty much impossible for OCR programs to read, and then uses those for it’s CAPTCHAs, making it far more secure than other solutions.

Asirra

This is a Microsoft Research project adds a dash of cute to a website by asking users to identify photos of dogs for cats (e.g. they’ll be asked to identify all of the cat pictures in a set that mixes both cat and dog photos). It’s powered by a unique partnership with Petfinder.com, and according to their user studies, not only can people accomplish this task quickly and accurately, but a lot of them also think it is fun.

Confident Technologies

Another similar CAPTCHA solution is available from Confident Technologies, which provides clickable picture CAPTCHAs that stop spam and bots by asking visitors to click on specific pictures. This tool comes in various international languages (including French, Spanish, German and more), is already mobile-optimized and allows websites to brand their CAPTCHA using their own unique logos and marketing messages.

Ironclad CAPTCHA

Ironclad CAPTCHA is a solution from the Security Stronghold company that presents a set of 3D objects for users to count and identify. According to its website, the solution is “easy for even a kid, impossible for [a] robot.” A box will appear with a variety of 3D objects and ask users to count how many individual objects they see. And the best part is, it’s totally free!

PlayThru

If CAPTCHAs are driving away users, why not give them a game to play instead? At least, that’s the idea the folks at Are You a Human had when they created PlayThru, a cloud-based service that provides little interactive minigames with simple tasks (e.g. drag the food items into the refrigerator) that users must complete before they can move to another part of a website.

NuCAPTCHA

NuCAPTCHA takes a new approach to CAPTCHA security by using videos that feature easy-to-read streaming letters, as opposed to a traditional static box. It’s also much less of a hassle for developers to integrate into their sites and can be customized in a skinless form that lets designers match it to the them of their websites.

Solve Media

Advertising is everywhere these days, and now it’s even in our CAPTCHAs thanks to Solve Media, which has created a CATPCHA and display ad hybrid that asks users to answer a simple question about an ad that it shows them from another company. Advertisers pay for these appearances, and publishers will share half of their ad revenue with Solve. In other words, this is a solution that allows you to monetize your CAPTCHAs and keep spam bots away at the same time.

Themed, Game-Based CAPTCHA

Pete Prestipino — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 13:00:00 GMT

Detroit-based Are You a Human, which designs small, compact games to verify human interaction on web sites (a modern day CAPTCHA if you will), recently introduced new customization options for PlayThru, its game-based authentication tool.

Paying subscribers of the Are You a Human’s service (which starts ay$19/mo) can select from different sets of themed games, adjust the strictness of the games’ scoring algorithms, and display translations for Spanish, French and German users.

“Greater customization of PlayThru has been one of our most requested features,” said Reid Tatoris, COO of Are You a Human. “We’re thrilled to provide even better ways for our customers to integrate PlayThru beautifully and seamlessly with their web sites.”

More than 10 million PlayThru games have been conducted on more than 3,500 sites including Quicken Loans, Fathead and AVG Canada since its launch in May 2012. PlayThru is a uniquely elegant solution to the poor user experience presented by traditional text-based CAPTCHAs. Who wouldn’t rather drag and drop topping onto a pizza that type in some obscured numbers; Web professionals would be savvy to consider the alternative to obscured words - one of which should most definitely be PlayThru.

The PlayThru solution integrates with multiple CMS platforms including WordPress, Drupal, PHPBB and vBulletin, and even includes libraries for popular code formats.

Can Nu Campaign Fix Captcha?

Michael Garrity — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 22:00:00 GMT

NuCaptcha Inc., the "Human-Friendly" Captcha, is urging users to "Make the Switch" with their new campaign.

While the implementation of Captchas has certainly been a good thing for website users and owners looking for both security online and a way to reduce or eliminate spam, its flaws can, at times, be very apparent.

In most cases, Captchas pose little to no problems, unless you're a bot. However, there are several instances when Captchas prove to be more of a hindrance than a help, whether it is because of a design issue or a user-related one. For example, a user with eyesight issues may have trouble making out the letters on a Captcha, and without help this could force them to abandon the task at hand; this could be problematic if he or she were trying to do time-sensitive online banking or bill paying.

More common, however, are problems that arise from poorly designed or difficult Captchas that can be tiring for any user to try to decipher. Just look at this list of the "top 10 worst Captcha's [sic] ever."

Complicated or confusing Captchas are an extremely easy way to drive users away from your site and drastically diminish conversion, so unless that is your business model (for some reason), you'd probably be better off trying to keep things as simple as possible.

This is the goal of NuCaptcha, company whose platform delivers a fast and easy way to complete a Captcha and also provides high website security. The whole idea behind the product is a simple Captcha interface that is specifically designed to retain users on a site and help them to quickly and efficiently pass through security.

Just last week, NuCaptcha announced their "Make the Switch" campaign in an attempt to attract website owners and, so they claim, put an end to Captcha-related frustrations on the part of the site's users. The company's endeavors are going to be aimed at site owners and webmasters looking for a user-friendly alternative to traditional Captcha platforms.

NuCaptcha's cutting-edge Captcha technology requires users to type in as little as 3 letters and can typically be completed in under 3 seconds.

The platform will enable websites of all sizes to choose their Captcha security and user-experience, which before was only possible for the highest-volume Captcha sites. They offer a variety of video-based templates that can be selected by owners to fit their look and feel of their individual website thanks to a new custom skinning technology (which is not as gross as it sounds). Owners are also able to control as many or as few details as they choose, such as size, choice of videos, security level and even optional branding, advertising and revenue production through NuCaptcha's advertising partners.

Website owners, particularly those who are on a tight budget but who want to utilize the security features that come with a Captcha platform, may want to start thinking about looking into a product like this. NuCaptcha offers a variety of choices for owners, such as their Free, Pro and Enterprise models, which all utilize the same usability and security features.

Captcha Innovation - Captcha The Dog

Pete Prestipino — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 22:41:00 GMT

CAPTCHA's (Completely Automated Public Turing Test to Tell Computers and Humans Apart) are problematic, as they are often difficult for humans to read and relatively simple (with a little soft-hacking) for spammers to gain control. Fortunately, there is some innovation occuring in the CAPTCHA market, the latest of which is Captcha The Dog, a program that uses a random sequence of nine images (not letters or numbers) to foil spambots.

“Essentially it’s a game of ‘which one of these things is not like the other?’ A visitor must correctly select the one dissimilar image correctly 5 times in a row. The process is easy for humans, takes a few seconds, and is highly effective in deterring would-be spammers," said developer Daniel McMullan. “The key is that the site owner uses his or her own personal images.” McMullan says the images could be dogs and cats, trees and flowers, cars and trucks, trucks and flowers, or whatever the site owner chooses. He says that even when a human trains a spambot that is based on the site owner’s nine images, that spambot will only succeed once. “As soon as one spam gets through, a new image is integrated—that spambot now needs retraining.”

A free trial of McMullan’s CAPTCHA THE DOG application is currently available at: captchathedog.com. Users who want to deploy their own images, can set up a one-year customized CAPTCHA THE DOG account for $25.