Recaptcha has gone from "make sure you're not a robot" to "make sure you're not blocking Google's ad revenue".
this post was submitted on 09 May 2026
195 points (99.0% liked)
Privacy
50695 readers
659 users here now
A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.
Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.
In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.
Some Rules
- Posting a link to a website containing tracking isn't great, if contents of the website are behind a paywall maybe copy them into the post
- Don't promote proprietary software
- Try to keep things on topic
- If you have a question, please try searching for previous discussions, maybe it has already been answered
- Reposts are fine, but should have at least a couple of weeks in between so that the post can reach a new audience
- Be nice :)
Related communities
much thanks to @gary_host_laptop for the logo design :)
founded 6 years ago
MODERATORS
Very well said!
So not only google is trying yo crush fdroid, they're also trying to crush anything without google services. I really wish the EU moved immediately on this one...
And if AluminumOS succeeds, your desktop will succumb to the same thing, as Google will view Windows, Mac, and Linux as a threat at that point and do everything to stamp out all three.
Like, how soon before doing anything at all on desktop is considered 'suspicious activity' by Google?
Likely illegal in the EU; somebody should bring this to the attention of applicable authorities when it scales.
Not a lawyer, but this sounds antitrust here in the States too.
Ahahahahahahahaha. If only we had people to protect us from that
Lina Kahn was doing an admirable job during the previous administration. It felt like the start of something real. This was so distasteful to the 1% that they requested her removal as a condition of any Harris campaign funding.
Well it would be if your government weren't, ahem, pardon the frank expression, completely fucked up
Under which law it would be illegal? I'd love for this to be true but highly doubt it.
Digital Markets Act
How? I don't see it.
I've been on the fence as to what my next phone will be based on the specs, Pixel or Moto, with GrapheneOS.
No freakin way is Google getting any of my money.
Time to investigate the I2P network and spend less time on the clearweb.
Is it even confirmed that it will be Moto who's coming up with GOS? Like, say, a published release date and price range?
The partnership was announced months ago by Motorola and GrapheneOS. The phone hadn't been named but should be released in 2027.
No freakin way is Google getting any of my money.
So problem solved. Get the Moto.
I thought I was clear about that.
What is supposed to happen with desktops here? If they require a phone to pass the captcha on the desktop that is already a huge issue and many people will complain about that regardless of play services.
IDK but recapatch hasn't worked for me on desktop. Since like... forever.
What happens is... I click the squares that contains the stairs. Or motorcycles, traffic lights, buses, w/e. Try to guess whether a sq counts if there are like 2 pixels of railing. Is railing part of the stairs? IDK. Doesn't matter tho. Google rejects anything I try and displays another captcha. Same result with that one. Fucking endlessly. It will NEVER let me past. I've tried some dozens in a row.
I think that is because G can't ID me to a particular human. So it does not matter how I answer them. "You shall not pass." G had a patent on "endless rejection" techniques. Instead of an outright block, it presents you with infinite unsolvable captchas.
Someone once analyzed web based recapatcha. Their conclusion was, G isn't trying to figure out whether you are human. It's trying to figure out WHICH human you are. It's identity resolution, not bot detection. If it can't get a high enough confidence estimate, you get denied. Sometimes with infinite captchas.
Yay. Let's make this asshole company the gatekeeper to the fucking internet.
Have you considered the possibility you are a robot? /s
There are other captcha providers. If only companies would start using them instead of Google.
Have you considered the possibility you are a robot? /s
Hmmm. It would come as a surprise. I'm willing to consider it tho. :D
Yeah I've had better luck with non-G captchas. Many of those work. There's some sliding puzzle piece one that works fine.
Long run, I wonder if captchas are a dead end. AIs can learn to solve them as well as ppl can. So what remains is to mimic the signatures of a human. Little jitters in mouse movements. Or variations in timing. But AIs can easily learn those too. So we end up with many real humans excluded, while many bots get in.
Someone once analyzed web based recapatcha. Their conclusion was, G isn’t trying to figure out whether you are human. It’s trying to figure out WHICH human you are. It’s identity resolution, not bot detection. If it can’t get a high enough confidence estimate, you get denied. Sometimes with infinite captchas.
I'd be interested in reading/watching if you can recall the source.
Tryin to trawl through my saved bookmarks... it might(???) have been this link. But when I try it now, it's an invalid URL. It was years ago. Maybe the site or domain wasn't kept up. So I'm not completely sure that was even the right URL.
https://hfet.org/google-recaptcha-privacy-nightmare/
I searched just now and found a few sites mirroring the claim. But they did not have the technical breakdown. Here's something from The Register.
That story claims too, the more you are in google's ecosystem, the easier you can pass the recaptcha. For example, Chrome users get past easer than Firefox.
I do have working a link about the infinite captcha block technique! Blocking via an unsolvable CAPTCHA. Warning, google domain. Goes to patents.google.
Oh thanks.
That's def not the one I was thinking of then.
@iturnedintoanewt @LeapSecond If AluminumOS takes off, desktops are going to be Google's next destruction target.
That's a big if though, considering that Chromebooks didn't exactly take off either.
Meh, most shity websites use recaptcha so not much of a loss
So does that lock out not only deGoogled Android devices, but also Huawei smartphones?
I think huawei will be Ok. They've been successfully navigating this for a few years now. The Chinese market will continue to do its own thing without google. Just like until now.
Can I run an android vm around this
Sure. As long as you don't plan on using anything much online with it. Any connection that triggers a captcha will be un-passable without play services installed.