Is a CAPTCHA test really the way to go?

CAPTCHA tests have become more and more popular. These visual confirmations needed to do some action, post a reply, register somewhere, ... can now be seen a lot more then a year ago.

The description of a CAPTCHA test:

A CAPTCHA test is a program that can generate and grade tests that:
  • Most humans can pass.
  • Current computer programs can't pass.
But is this really such a good solution? I have just read a post about the Windows Genuine Advantage Program giving blind users problems, because they have to provide the key, which can only be read, which is a problem for blind users.

Something that I immediately thought of was the CAPTCHA test... If this gets widespread, all blind people will basicly be unable to do anything. They cannot see the test, their browsers can't help and then can't register, reply or anything else where there's such a test.

There isn't a real solution to it, you can't give the blind any information about the test, because that would beat the purpose of the test. IF someone invents software to help blind people with it, spammers can use it as well, so I don't see a solution to help blind people with CAPTCHA, besides not implementing one.

Your thoughts?

5 Comments

  • What about something like this.

    If you can't read the image click here to hear it aloud.



    Then when they click it you play a sound through flash.

  • But then again, how many blind *and* deaf people are actually using a computer? I don't personally know of any easy way to do so.



    What about a small comprehension question... in slang? Maybe something like:



    "sup dude! listen, if ur broke and i give u 10 greens, how much u've got then?"



    Actually, forget slang, maybe just comprehension question that can't possibly be understood by a machine. It can be related to a culture, common sense or simple human logic. It's an old idea, but it can be put into actual use, don't you think?

  • Rami, then you are excluding stupid people.

  • Ooops, missed that :) Maybe those should be banned from logging in altogther though....

  • Well,



    concerning blind people ... one of the rules oen has to follow to keep a website "blind surfer friendly" is providing alt text info for every image or other media objects on a website.



    CAPTCHA is just another one of those objects, but ... it's not easy to solve ... giving it an alt text property makes is readable for non humans again I guess ...

    Sound is indeed not for everyone a solution ... there are devices that transform text into braille ... so that wouldn't work either.



    But I think we might say that blind AND deaf people surfing with those braille devices indeed are a very small minority, and very aware of the limitations of their system.



    But when you target those kind of people I guess you have to take the risk of spamming and NOT use things like CAPTCHA.





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