Summary
From the early days of the internet one of the biggest problems service providers had was spam. Computers pretending to be people and making accounts, signing up for services, etc. The solution which is a test that can differentiate humans and computers. So basically, it's a test that humans can pass but computers can't. But computers needed to be able to grade the test.
Captcha would take the answer word, and stretch and format it so it didn't look like the word anymore. This was easy for Humans who have been learning to read since they were kids. But impossible for computers at the time.
Captcha was acquired by google which started using it to digitalize paper books. In just 4 days, captcha was able to digitize an entire years worth of New York Time articles. After that, they switched to actual images of streets. Where are the cross walks, fire hydrants, signs. This would help power their driverless car AI, effectively killing two birds with one stone.
Now, captcha doesn't even have to ask you questions. The website is tracking every movement you make. The behavior tracking is enough to determine if you are a computer or a human. But it will only be time until computers are able to be completely indistinguishable from humans.
Vocabulary Match
Conversation Question
Have you ever gotten spam before? What type of spam have you seen?
Why was captcha consider killing two birds with one stone?
Is behavior tracking an invasion of your privacy?
Do you think it is important to digitize things? What do you think should be digitize?
What should they teach computers to see next?
Comments