Why, suddenly, does everybody need to know if I'm a robot or not?

[FunkyMonkee]

I open an e-mail from a job search site and the first thing it asks when I click on the link to take me to the job they're alerting me to is if I'm a robot! WHY would that matter?
I go to a site where I can DL music after it converts the link into an MP3 and, before I can start the process, I have to prove I'm not a robot! WHY? What possible difference could it make? What if I WAS a robot and responded like a human to their query?

[Veronika_p]

The amount of bots being used for illegal activities are the actual cost, data stealing, streams, fake calls, stealing credit cards and banking informations.. people are doing a lot of scary things with bots..

The worst part of it is that the bots now know how to bypass the "I am not a bot"

[FunkyMonkee]

What kind of data can they steal from a job ad or a music DL page?

[egarcia1360]

It's for spam prevention. One visitor to a website (in your case, one job application or one song download) is pretty much negligible, sure. But make that hundreds, thousands, or even more, and the hosting costs add up, with no actual site visitor to view ads, click affiliate links, or provide meaningful data. And it's only getting worse now with how popular AI is getting. Basically, it's the websites' way of protecting themselves from malicious traffic.

[jshm2]

LOL, it means your computer or IP has been used repeatedly and they are suspicious of activity.

[NathanDavis]

because nowadays...

60% of the internet traffic is actually bots and AI crawlers...

[rgb008]

Robots are getting trickier. I keep getting asked too 😭

[FunkyMonkee]

Yeah? So? Who cares if it's a robot that answers the job ad or tries to DL those videos? What's it gonna hurt if a robot DOES answer the ad or DL those videos?

[WhitneySnow]

Robots spam websites