CAPTCHAs and sign‑up quizzes annoy real people and barely slow down determined bots. As the fediverse grows, we need smarter, more humane defences, ones that don’t push away genuine newcomers. What creative, non‑intrusive ideas do you have? Trust‑based vouching, proof‑of‑humanity protocols, behavioural signals… what feels both effective and aligned with the open social web? I’m building a social media platform and I’d love to hear your thoughts on this topic.
You could try Anubis? From what I’ve heard it works well against bots - but if not implemented properly can also block “good scrapers” like search engines and the internet archive that increase discoverability
Does not work well against propaganda bots, as those don’t mind wasting time on the CPU cycles. And propaganda bots are the ones we should fear the most on the fediverse.