Challenge-Response for the BLIND?

[Jason Clinton]

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Leo J Mauler wrote:
| I've been reading a bit about the challenge-response anti-spam
| system.

Bad idea unless in the worst of situations; you are effectively doubling
the amount of traffic generated by spam.

| Basically, when someone sends you an E-mail, and they are not on the
| "allowed" list, an autoresponder sends an E-mail back requesting a
| response, only using a picture of a number to verify that the
| original sender is not a spam-generating marketing computer.  If the
| live person reads the picture and sends back the number in it, the
| live person gets added to your list of "people who are allowed to
| send me E-mail".

Even the simplest challenge-response would defeat 99% of spam because
99% is sent from bogus email addresses or machines that are coopted for
spam sending for a short period of time. I see no need to send hundreds
pictures or audio per day out from your account for a challenge response
when only a tiny fraction of those will every actually be seen by
anyone. A simple "reply to this message to be added to my whitelist"
should work.

| system of challenge-response which does not have an audio alternative
| is in violation of the A.D.A. or a similar law I don't know about.

This is a popular myth. Despite what you may have heard, the A.D.A.
doesn't affect anything but government agencies.

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