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Confusion From Comments And The CAPTCHA

This week, we're seeing complaints from quite a few angry blog owners, in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue.
Why do I have to solve a CAPTCHA, to comment on my own blog?
and
Everybody sees a CAPTCHA - even if they are logged in to Blogger!
Previously, the CAPTCHA was visible only to those not logged in to Blogger, or to those wishing to comment, anonymously.

It appears that the full page and popup window comment forms were updated, possibly to make the CAPTCHA form more usable, for those blog readers who are using a computer subject to filtering of "third party" cookies.

The CAPTCHA appears to be always required.

The effect that we are now seeing is that the CAPTCHA appears to be required, for all comments, when the full page and popup window forms are used.

In some cases, even with the CAPTCHA displayed, you can publish without solving.

  • If you are authenticated, the reCAPTCHA, though displayed, may not require solution.
  • If you are authenticated, and a blog member, neither the ezCAPTCHA nor the reCAPTCHA should require solution.

In either case, simply compose and Publish your comment.

People who wish to publish anonymously will always have to solve a CAPTCHA.

Unfortunately, people who are publishing anonymously will still need to solve the CAPTCHA. The non optional reCAPTCHA, which gets displayed, is not as easy to solve as the optional ezCAPTCHA.

Cookie filtering, once again, may be part of the problem.

To increase the confusion, people using a computer where "third party" cookies are filtered will be treated as if they are publishing anonymously, and will have to solve the reCAPTCHA. Some people, who think that they are properly authenticated, will find out otherwise, if they try to publish a comment without solving the CAPTCHA.

Continuing to cause confusion, in some cases, comments entered may simply vanish, if the CAPTCHA can't be displayed when necessary. This, is another consequence of cookie filtering.

Comments

Anonymous said…
I figured some sort of glitch was going on. It won't keep me from commenting on blogs and doing what I need to do, so no worries here. Thanks for this post about it though.
Nance said…
Chuck, thank you for addressing this issue in an updated post. Good to know that Blogger is aware and looking into it.
Jill said…
When CAPTCHA was fixed around 10/21/14 my spam dropped to zero for about 20 days. Now it's up to 14 or so a day again. A lot of them are the same junk messages that I've been getting for several years.
Sally H said…
This is a major issue for me. I need to comment on lots of posts as part of a challenge blog and it is taking me a much longer time. Please get it sorted ASAP!
Carla said…
Thank you for your quick response. My blog comments still has 'prove you're not a robot' even though I have word verification turned 'off'
Unknown said…
I am glad they are working on fixing the problem. Hey, the CAPTCHA box did not appear here! Has the problem been at least partially fixed?
Nitecruzr said…
Carla,

Is your blog moderated, or non moderated? The initial fix, which went in yesterday, was for blogs with no CAPTCHA, moderated.
Nitecruzr said…
Jerry,

The initial fix, which went in yesterday, was for blogs with no CAPTCHA, moderated. You can rejoice with me, as that includes this blog.
Tindaloo said…
Thank you!!! Linking to your blogpost in one I'm doing now to alert bloggers :)
Shelly said…
Thank you for this post. This post is the only one I could find addressing this issue.

I only knew of this change because my Grandma cannot figure out how to comment on my blog now. She does not have an account and won't set one up. She just always used "Anonymous" and signed her name in the comment box. :) I knew I had word verification set to off so I couldn't for the life of me figure out why she was seeing the CAPTCHA box all of a sudden!

I understand the need to stop spam, but for a super small time blogger like me it is a bit silly to make my handful of commenters go through this.

As you suggest, I'll switch to moderated comments to try and get rid of it, but trying to figure out all these changes and then find work arounds is really sucking the joy out of blogging.
*Vicki* said…
Well the embedding does NOT work! I find that when I start out commenting, I don't see any CAPTCHA box at all. After I've left several comments, it pops up NO MATTER WHAT! It's really frustrating when I have several comments to leave for other people's blog especially since the majority of them are all blogger blogs!

I firmly believe that the settings should be left in the hands of the owner's blog. If I don't like a comment, I go in and delete it so that my readers don't see the comment, so I don't see the big deal no matter what form of commenting someone chooses! I don't like having to prove I'm a robot if I have an account and a blogger blog of my own. Really frustrating!
*Vicki* said…
And by the way, I had to verify the CAPTCHA on this comment! The first question was wrong of course! Foreign language blogs are even more frustrating because I can't read what question it's asking me!! So then I have to verbally listen to the verification!

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