CAPTCHA

ELI5 — The Vibe Check

CAPTCHA is that annoying 'select all traffic lights' test that proves you're human. It stops bots from creating accounts, submitting forms, and brute-forcing logins. Modern CAPTCHAs (reCAPTCHA v3, Turnstile) work invisibly by analyzing behavior. Less annoying, same protection.

Real Talk

CAPTCHA prevents automated abuse of web forms and APIs. Modern implementations include Google reCAPTCHA v3 (risk scoring), Cloudflare Turnstile (privacy-preserving), and hCaptcha. They analyze behavioral signals instead of requiring explicit user interaction.

When You'll Hear This

"reCAPTCHA v3 runs invisibly and assigns a risk score — no puzzles for real users." / "We use Cloudflare Turnstile instead of reCAPTCHA because it doesn't track users."