If you use the web for more than just browsing (that’s pretty much everyone), chances are you’ve had your fair share of “CAPTCHA rage,” the frustration stemming from trying to discern a marginally legible string of letters aimed at verifying that you are a human. CAPTCHA, which stands for “Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart,” was introduced to the Internet a decade ago and has seen widespread adoption in various forms — whether using letters, sounds, math equations, or images — even as complaints about their use continue.
A large-scale Stanford study a few years ago concluded that “CAPTCHAs are often difficult for humans.” It has also been reported that around 1 in 5 visitors will leave a website rather than complete a CAPTCHA.
A longstanding belief is that the inconvenience of using CAPTCHAs is the price we all pay for having secured websites. But there’s no escaping that CAPTCHAs are becoming harder for humans and easier for artificial intelligence programs to solve.
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