FriendlyCaptcha
The user-friendly CAPTCHA alternative
FriendlyCaptcha is a tool for preventing spam on your website
Other CAPTCHAs are a burden on your users, FriendlyCaptcha respects your users.
The problem with other CAPTCHAs
Click to expand the items below.Accessibility
Normal CAPTCHA tasks are not easy for all humans. Those with poor eyesight, hearing or even using a screenreader may struggle to perform the tasks and are delayed or even denied access.
Usability and conversion
Nobody wants to label cars when all they wanted to do is post a comment. Every second spent labeling images is an opportunity for a visitor to give up on your website.
Privacy
The most popular CAPTCHA system, Google ReCAPTCHA depends on tracking users and collecting user data across the internet.
This is a price that you are forcing your users to pay in order to use your website. They can not opt out.
Bandwidth
Solving a full ReCAPTCHA challenge takes up to 2MB of bandwidth, which is a lot for users on a limited data plan.
It's broken
Tasks that are easy for all humans but difficult for computers may no longer exist.
Using machine learning or even browser plugins one can solve ReCAPTCHA in under a second. There are even CAPTCHA solving companies that offer thousands of solves for $1.
Normal CAPTCHAs are no longer effective at distinguishing users from bots.
VPN users get punished
ReCAPTCHA can not be reached consistently from certain countries such as China without a VPN. VPN users have to complete a never-ending amount of labeling tasks because they are harder to track for Google's anti-bot protection.
FriendlyCaptcha is different
FriendlyCaptcha is a proof-of-work based CAPTCHA in which the user's device does all the work.
Try the Live Demo ⇗Solving it will take a few seconds on a desktop computer, and up to 20 seconds on old smartphones.
By the time the user is ready to submit, the puzzle is probably already solved.
How does FriendlyCaptcha tell apart bots from humans?
It doesn't, FriendlyCaptcha adds a small cost and complexity for spammers that becomes large at scale.
For normal CAPTCHAs a spammer would use a machine learning model or pay for a clickfarm, with FriendlyCaptcha they have to solve the crypto puzzle instead. Both approaches are effective against untargeted spam, but the user experience is very different.
Note: if an attacker is determined to spam your website in particular they can do so regardless of which CAPTCHA you use.
FriendlyCaptcha will prevent 99.9% of spam and doesn't punish real users in doing so.
Pricing
No payment details are required for the trial. You will not be automatically billed at the end of the trial period.
If your company has special requirements such as self-hosting, larger volumes, or a whitelabel solution, please reach out.
Alternatively, do it yourself
FriendlyCaptcha is open source allowing you to build out this service yourself.
If any individual or company would like to sponsor this project, I would love to make the free tier much larger (i.e. removing the $9 tier entirely). I honestly believe the internet would be a better place without as much ReCAPTCHA everywhere.
Do right by your visitors and replace ReCAPTCHA today
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