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There are those who think that There are no people on the internet and everything is bots.is what is known as dead internet theory. For years, we have used captcha technology to prove that we are not robots, but visual tests and puzzles are no longer reliable proof because AI can skip them without problem. The solution is to make us scan QR codes, but there is an ulterior motive behind it. Scan to verify you are a person. This is what I found this morning when trying to enter a website. My first instinct was to check the URL and all the details in case I was facing some kind of scam, but no. I took out my phone, opened the Google app and scanned the QR to access it. It is the new reCAPTCHA method to verify that we are not a bot. Although this novelty was introduced last monthI had not come across one of these QR until today. An anti-AI test. As we said, AI has managed to solve the most common captcha tests, such as the classic visual tests that ask us to select elements from an image or write the letters and numbers in an image. The solution that Google, owner of reCAPTCHA, has found is to make us scan a QR code with our mobile phone. The function is called Mobile verification” and They describe it like this: “In addition to visual challenges, it includes AI-resistant controls that use a mobile device to scan a QR code and verify human presence and device integrity.” At the moment this function is in the experimental phase and we can still use the visual challenges by clicking on the eye icon, but everything indicates that it will become the verification standard. The real reason. Being resistant to AI is not the only reason for this new method, there is something else that has consequences for many users. With mobile verification, Google has linked reCAPTCHA to Google Play Services making it only work with devices that have a current version of Google services. In practice, this means that users of Android phones without Google, such as Fairphone, GrapheneOS or Huawei phones, will not be able to verify that they are human. In other words: either you use our services or you will not be able to browse freely. No problems on iOS. As they point out in this Reddit threadGoogle could argue that having Play services updated is a security issue, but at the same time they allow the system to work on iOS where you are not forced to install any software. I have scanned the code myself from an iPhone and the only requirement is that the device has iOS 16.4 or a later version, something that almost all iPhones will comply with without problems. This shows that it is not about security, but about controlling the ecosystem and penalizing those who try to escape from it. The danger of QR. During the pandemic, QR code scanning had a golden age thanks to restaurants eliminating physical menus. This caused the QRishing scams, which basically consists of falsifying the QR codes so that they direct us to a fraudulent website. If Google normalizes QR scanning to browse the web, it’s a matter of time before fake codes posing as reCAPTCHA verification start appearing and scammers have a field day. Image | reddit In Xataka | You thought you were solving a CAPTCHA to enter a website. You were actually training an AI