Patrick in Falls Church, VA asks: When filling out online forms, I’m often asked to enter a security code or CAPTCHA. What is the reason for this annoying extra step?
CAPTCHAs are yet another weapon designed be used in the war against spammers, bots and scammers.
A CAPTCHA is a program that protects websites against bots by generating and grading tests that humans can pass but most computer programs fail. The process usually involves a computer asking a user to complete a simple test which the computer is able to grade. Based on the grade, the computer will then determine if the user is human, which then determines if the user is allowed to proceed with the task.
Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University coined the term CAPTCHA to define the technique for ensuring that responses received online were from actual human beings. The acronym stands for “Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart.”
The most common CAPTCHA tests display a series of numbers and letters that is distorted or on a background that makes the characters difficult for humans to read and close to impossible for artificial intelligence to decipher. We all know that if you don’t type that code exactly right in the box, your request will not be processed.
Example of a CAPTCHA test
These programs definitely serve a legitimate purpose. Primary uses for CAPTCHA programs include protecting blogs against comment spam, ensuring that free services (like email accounts) are being registered for by actual human users, protecting email addresses from web scrapers, validating the integrity of online polls and general spam and worm prevention.
At Teltek, we have implemented these programs on our telecommunications and IT Services websites on our home pages and blog pages to ensure that all requests and responses are being generated by humans.
Installing a CAPTCHA on your site is fairly simple. Plugins and controls are available for WordPress, MediaWiki, PHP, ASP.NET, Java and many other environments.
Some versions of the program are equipped with an audio test to allow blind users to take the test. The official website of CAPTCHA is catptcha.net and you can find more information and a thorough list of guidelines for effectively using CAPTCHA on that site.
Like all technology, CAPTCHA programs will continue to evolve and if you have not yet seen other forms of it, like distorted images, image recognition and simple game versions, you will probably come across them in the near future.
If you are worried about how well your office equipment is protected against spammers, bots and scammers, call Teltek IT! We can get you set up with antivirus, antispam and antispyware protection. Everything from installation, monitoring and upgrading can be handled for you by our certified engineers.
Teltek is proud to offer IT services as the fourth component to our multi-systems approach as your single source technology services company. This Managed Service Provider (MSP) offering completes our longstanding goal to provide our clients with a one-call resource for all of their business technology needs. IT outsourcing, remote back up and disaster recovery, helpdesk support, computer network relocations, security products and server/desktop virtualization are just a few of the services now available.