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it seems, yahoo has finally found some answer to the annoying bots in the chat rooms. The idea is good, but it will surely discourage impatient chatters from frequently coming to chat rooms.
I am not very comfortable to entering the verification code every time I want to enter a chat room. It takes time and also if the captcha web server is slow, you cannot enter the chat room.
I knew the yahoo folks were thinking something in the line of word verification as it is very effective way of verifiying human from bots or scripts. They could have done it through some other way, like displaying the verification code in the same window rather than opening a new browswer window to display the verification code. I hope yahoo folks are listening !!
Nevertheless, the chat rooms look neat and clean now. Thanks yahoo.. pat on your backs đŸ™‚
– gud
Yes, they have the new (and wonderful) captcha system to help keep bots out. However I feel it’s a matter of time before somebody (bot makers most likely) devises a tactic to bypass the captcha altogether.
Captchas are pretty effective deterrents, but the bot makers are persistent. In other realms, captcha has been used to stop spammers from posting to blogs, or registering at forums like BigBlueBall.com. They work, but they need to be updated or strengthened periodically as the spammers and bots devise ways to “read” the captcha.
I think the captcha will be effective in the end. Yes, some bot-makers will break the captcha protection, but then Yahoo! will come out with a new-and-improved captcha.
In a way, it becomes a game of cat and mouse, each one trying to stay one step ahead of the other.
I stopped in the chat rooms today and unfortunately there were a few bots. Not many, but nonetheless….Im sure there will be more eventually.
Well, most bots can be “started” by a person, who can read and enter the captcha code just fine. Of course, that person most likely doesn’t want to site around entering captcha codes and starting up bots all day, so you’re not going to see as many. But usually bots permit a sort of “manual override” that allows a real person to take control and sign in.
They are on the right track, however it seems alot of people that aren’t bots are having trouble talking once they get into a room. Hopefully this is a work in progress!
yes there are some porn bots already taking control again. It’s easy to see they’re from the same maker by taking a look at the names. it’s just a matter of time before they’re back in full force. with all the 3rd party programs out there that filter and auto-ignore this crap it amazes me that the so-called tech folks at yahoo haven’t done the same. i usually hit the ignore button and checkmark the spam box but that doesn’t seem to work. why have a spam checkmark if yahoo doesn’t delete the accounts? There needs to be a system in place for the legitimate chatters to be able to self-police the rooms. Example would be after X amount of times the profile is reported as spam it is automatically deleted. i’m sure the folks that enjoy clean rooms would have absolutely no problem in policing the rooms.
Hi Jimmy,
I agree with your points. I chat in IRC and they have this system in which every channel is owned by an opertaor. he/she has full control over the channel due to which the bot attacks are minimized.
Yahoo should think of some more novel ways of stopping bots, like asking for verficiation code, say after every five minutes. This way, the bot starter would have to enter the verificaton code after every five minutes.
I can also see some of the bots returning, and if the old ones take over these chat rooms once again, then this effort is simply a waste.The spam check box option is also of no use. If they start deleting the account based on spam check, then I can get any account deleted by simply clicking the spam check box. I think they are using some kind of statistics before they decide to delete the account based on spam check box.
I think there is hardly any way to stop these bots. The most effective method woudl be to make it a paid service, which I am sure will not be accepted by the cyber space lovers đŸ™‚– gud
One of the biggest mistakes they made was eliminating the option to create your own room. I would love to be able to create my own room and have the control to boot the bots and troublemakers. The only way to control the bots and make it enjoyable is to be able to self police. As long as Yahoo keeps dreaming up these useless automated controls the bots will continue to take over. I was in a room today with 17 users…9 were bots all starting with similarities in the user name. I think most yahoo Chat users will just have to accept the fact that it’s free and yahoo doesn’t have qualified tech folks to support it. All the rooms I looked at today said there was 50 people in them, when in fact there was 12 – 15. Or, the rooms say they’re full, when you do finally get in there’s only 10 folks there. these are just examples that lead me to believe that the quality of tech types needed just isn’t there. Oh, and forget about paying. I wouldn’t pay a nickel for the level of support they provide. If they charged they’d have to make an attempt to get it right. Geez, think of the chaos it would create if they really had to be comitted to making it right. That would be a sight to see. The best thing management could do would be to fire 3 or 4 of the tech folks and bring on one guru that knows how to make things happen. I’m sure once someone from Yahoo reads that sentence they’ll delete this post.
Well, Yahoo removed the user rooms option because pedophiles were using them to prey on children. Yahoo got in trouble for allowing it to happen, so after an advertiser or two dropped their ads from Yahoo, they decided to drop user rooms forever.
As an alternative to Yahoo! Chat, Meebo allows you to create your own rooms. And Meebo also can be used to connect to your Yahoo! Messenger contacts (and AIM, ICQ, Google Talk, WLM, etc.).
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