Image based reCAPTCHA is so ambiguous that it is unsolvable

[Ian Gardocki]

I just did a test of your image based reCAPTCHA. (actually I was trying to submit a post elsewhere and after a handful of tries I noticed a problem, so I started to take notes)

After 30+ attempts (again, I counted 30 tries AFTER I had already regenerated the reCAPTCHA a handful of times), I was unable to find a single example where there was not at least 1 ambiguous image in the set of 9. In hindsight I should have started taking screenshots, but words will have to suffice.

I found the ambiguity to fall under 3 groups. I saw all types pretty equally (with some sets falling into more than one type below). I'll give an example or 2 for each.

1. Unrecognizable images: Some are poorly framed to remove context. Some were terribly lit. Some had TERRIBLE artifacting. In all cases this made it impossible to tell what was in the image.
• "OK find the Plants. Is that a mushroom? No it looks more like a lady-bug. Or is it an umbrella? It does looks like a mushroom though..."
2. Background items that CLEARLY meet the requirements, or pictures with FAR to many items that MIGHT meet the requirements.
• I was asked to pick photos with French Fries. One of the images showed a plate with a steak and broccoli. However, The person sitting ACROSS the table had a steak with French Fries. The second plate was obviously not the subject of the photo, but the photo DID clearly have the required items in it.
• I was asked to pick photos with Motorcycles. One of the images was of a GIANT parking lot in front of a super-store. There were almost certainly motorcycles in it but there were literally hundreds of vehicles, including trucks pulling trailers with boats, and even some golf carts.
• I was asked to pick photos with Doughnuts. One image showed a table with desserts. This was a 25+ foot table PACKED with what appeared to be every dough or batter based food ever created. There were clearly doughnuts on the table, but you would probably miss them if you only glanced at it.
3. Items that may or may not fall into the required group.
• I was asked to pick photos with Motorcycles. There was a picture with a sport bike, a picture with a child riding a dirt bike, a picture with a Vespa style scooter, and a picture with a mountain bike. The sport bike is clearly a motorcycle, and the mountain bike is clearly not, but what about the middle two? I'm not sure where I'm supposed to draw the line.
• I was asked to pick photos with Commercial Vehicles twice. Among the possible choices were a yellow taxi, a pizza delivery scooter, a pickup truck with a decal for a landscaping business, a tractor, and a school bus. What definition of "Commercial Vehicle" and I supposed to be using here?

Now, normally in a case like this, I assume that I am the one with the problem. I must be over-thinking it. This service exists, and people use it. I don't see 100 other posts here about this problem.

But 100% of the cases I looked at? That just seems SO FAR off that I had to come tell someone about it.

Ian

[Jens Fischer]

Given the fact that ReCaptcha uses some kind of machine learning I noticed the following: There are several occurances where there is certainly only a single street sign within the selection. However Recaptcha won't accept one single street sign as an answer and asks the user to select more street signs. Nearly every user will select another image randomly to meet the request from ReCaptcha. I would think that this would lead the machine learning system into the wrong direction since the users will select images that do not contain any street signs because they are not allowed to make their actual selection.

[Unique One]

It still has not changed, 2 years later. Still asking dumb ambiguous questions with objects nobody knows if they are meant to click or not.

Google, who are you to call us real humans bots anyway? Is a bot not the source of your revenue? Do you block your bot with these walls? Hypocritical much?

I for one have had more then enough of these stupid captcha questions. Been filling them out for years and your stupid software still hasn't realized the obvious, that I indeed am not a bot. Machine learning... lol...