Ben Finney wrote: > Leif K-Brooks <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > >> Steven D'Aprano wrote: >>> For a text only solution, consider putting up a natural language >>> question >> That wouldn't work as a true CAPTCHA (Completely Automated *Public* >> Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart), since making the >> list of questions and answers public would defeat its purpose. > > The "Public" part of a CAPTCHA is the algorithm. The data consumed and > produced by the algorithm don't need to be publicly correlated -- and > indeed shouldn't be, for exactly the reason you state.
When the CAPTCHA is based entirely on a fixed list of questions and answers, I think it's reasonable to treat that list as part of the algorithm, since the CAPTCHA couldn't function without it. Similarly, I think most people would consider an image-based CAPTCHA for which the algorithm but not the fonts were available to be non-public -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
