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July 15, 2008

R.I.P. CAPTCHA Hello Spam! They've taken Yahoo!, Google, Hotmail and Craigslist. Be afraid... Be very, very afraid.

posted by es el Queso at 11:43PM UTC [trackback] (18 comments total)

Oh crap, early again. Sorry, 'Bashi. Time zones mess me up.

posted by es el Queso at 11:44PM UTC on July 15, 2008

Could this be related to this?

posted by RalphTheDog at 11:55PM UTC on July 15, 2008

Don't worry, cheese. It happens to me too.

posted by tracicle at 01:15AM UTC on July 16, 2008

I spent all this frustrating time unsuccessfully installing a CAPTCHA on a client's site. I guess now I have a good excuse to blow it off?

posted by Medusa at 01:41AM UTC on July 16, 2008

If the spammers manage to break a useful resource like Craigslist I am going to have their asses handed to them on a platter. Or something like that.

posted by rolypolyman at 04:31AM UTC on July 16, 2008

This article never explains how the CAPTCHA gets circumvented. Anybody have any ideas? My own explanation includes "magic", so I'm not the go-to-guy here.


posted by Nickdanger at 02:23PM UTC on July 16, 2008

Interesting article - ta honey.

posted by gomichild at 02:56PM UTC on July 16, 2008

Here's an interesting piece that is a bit more in-depth, Nick. It also mentions something about Russian operatives being paid $3 for successfully recognizing CAPTCHA images.

Then, there's always the pr0N angle [SFW] that has been around for some time now; desperate individuals are tricked into correctly entering CAPTCHAs for views at some free pics.

posted by sugarmilktea at 05:18PM UTC on July 16, 2008

Interesting, thanks smt.

posted by Nickdanger at 06:51PM UTC on July 16, 2008

If there's one constant in the universe, it's that there's always a pr0n angle.

posted by The Underpants Monster at 07:16PM UTC on July 16, 2008

And thank god for it.

posted by Nickdanger at 07:23PM UTC on July 16, 2008

I think a pr0nangle is like a pr0nagon, but with less people.

posted by Mr. Knickerbocker at 07:37PM UTC on July 16, 2008

I pr0ncrastinated again.

*hangs head*

posted by sugarmilktea at 08:38PM UTC on July 16, 2008

Hard to believe, but some hardcore software dudes at a few universities have developed character recognition algorithms that'll break captchas with a decent success rate.

posted by StoryBored at 01:28AM UTC on July 17, 2008

Ha! My professorial comment put an end to all the vulgar 'pron' remarks. That's more like it. A proper , buttoned down, chaste, polite born-again MoFi.

posted by StoryBored at 08:55PM UTC on July 17, 2008

Yes, very pr0nfessorial and pr0nfessional of you.

*bangs head*

If I were a pr0n star my name would be "Brad Nailer".

posted by ThinksTwice at 09:04PM UTC on July 17, 2008

Yes, StoryBored, but I feel that the general pr0n-ish feeling was still present in your comment - - what, with the "hardcore dudes breaking captchas" and such...

posted by sugarmilktea at 10:03PM UTC on July 17, 2008

Stop the pr0n!

posted by StoryBored at 01:36AM UTC on July 19, 2008

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