Google acquires system that prevents fraud and digitizes books

Google acquired a program developed at Carnegie Mellon that seeks to reduce spam and phishing, as it scans books.

With reCAPTCHA, the user must complete simple word games in order to register on a Web page or by completing an electronic purchase. As computers by themselves can not decipher distorted letters or numbers, the product ensures that customers really are and not automated programs that are running the board.

But reCAPTCHA offers something else: the puns come from real books, which makes the system you create digital versions of texts as users enter the words.

Google Inc. was developing a project of scanning books to place on the internet. In most cases, the "scan" and then used a program for optical character recognition engines that allow you to use in the text. However, this technique does not always work in books with impairments or with distorted letters. In such cases, the choice was typed by hand the work.

ReCAPTCHA offers another alternative to take the pieces that the computer does not recognize and separate them into individual words that are used in safety tests on the internet. Then again reCAPTCHA reconstruct the text of the book with the words entered by users.

Luis von Ahn, Carnegie Mellon professor who developed the tool and reCAPTCHA founded the company in 2008, said the program is great for Google.

Were not disclosed details of the acquisition, announced on Wednesday.