Computer scientists have developed artificial intelligence that can outsmart the Captcha website security check system.
Captcha challenges people to prove they are human by recognising combinations of letters and numbers that machines would struggle to complete correctly.
Researchers developed an algorithm that imitates how the human brain responds to these visual clues.
The neural network could identify letters and numbers from their shapes.
The research, conducted by Vicarious - a Californian artificial intelligence firm funded by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg - is published in the journal Science.
Good. Now maybe I can get past Captchas.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Sunday October 29 2017, @02:16AM (6 children)
You're probably right, that humans in general set a low bar for captcha crap. But, I can't even get up to that bar. A lot of them just kick my ass, and I just give up on them, because I just can't see whatever it is that I'm supposed to see.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 29 2017, @04:01AM (2 children)
Google's captchas are absolutely terrible. It'll give you a picture of a guy on a bike and ask you to find the street signs. And you have to pick the guy on the bike if you want to get it right.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Sunday October 29 2017, @09:56AM (1 child)
Actually, those captchas are much better than some of the others. The ones with a bunch of poorly drawn numerals, mixed in with a bunch of squiggly lines were among the worst. And, then there were the ones with poorly written letters, sometimes cursive, which were only a tiny bit better. I much prefer the math ones - a simple equation. Or even a not-so-simple one. Solve the problem put the solution in the box, and you're good to go. A logic question works, or even a history question. Physical sciences? That would work too. I hate that I have bad eyes, and that half the world thinks that hiding text in plain sight is the way to go.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 29 2017, @07:23PM
I have poor eyesight as well and have many friends that are blind or near-blind. I challenge almost anyone who thinks that visual CAPTCHAs are bad to try the audio ones. Some of those are just insane. They are random assemblages of noise and whatever. The Google ones can be frustrating too, as the answers have to match what most people put in and the audio is ~4 seconds clipped from random Google Voice phone messages. So, do you put the whole word in when it is cut off or just part? When two people talk over each other, which is the right answer? What about messages in foreign languages? Literal gibberish (like young children)? Completely made up of noise?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 29 2017, @05:28AM
Maybe that's because you mistakenly think your hero is called "Methanol-Fueled", not "Ethanol-fueled."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 29 2017, @12:45PM
Sounds like the captchas are working as designed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 29 2017, @06:35PM
I have great eyesight (official test a couple of months ago), but within the last year I think I needed to repeat two or three captcha tests.
They're just dumb.