chrisf
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Post by chrisf on Dec 11, 2015 10:41:16 GMT
So what I mean is: Anyone trying to buy the £50.01 would be too late as they would lose out to people who just tried for the £50 because of the 1 extra second it takes to type it. But if there was a bot doing the buying, it wouldn't take any longer to buy £50.01 than £50, so it would go for the whole £50.01. : Yes, it does take longer to type 50.01 than 50, but someone who's willing to take the pence probably will realise that it doesn't take any longer to type 51 than it does to type 50. I don't think your analysis of the situation considers that possibility. But that's JMHO. Yes, I agree that if a 50.01 part is up for sale and the whole 50.01 is taken, then we don't know whether is was bought by a human typing 51 or a bot (though probably not by a human typing 50.01 as they would be too slow), but if only £50 of a £50.01 part is bought, then I think it is safe to assume that was a human. This is my point although I am apparently not very good at making it.
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freddy
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Post by freddy on Dec 11, 2015 14:27:02 GMT
Just did an interesting little test.
I was over exposed in a particular problem loan so just put £2700 up for sale. The SM/loans page was empty.
i opened up SS on my desktop computer with the loans page open. I put the £2700 up for sale from my I-pad.
The loan for sale did not even flash up on my desktop. My available balance instantly changed to +£2700.
So, from what I saw, my loan part never appeared for sale it was just instantly sold. I'm talking 1 second.
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mikes1531
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Post by mikes1531 on Dec 11, 2015 22:13:28 GMT
Just did an interesting little test. I was over exposed in a particular problem loan so just put £2700 up for sale. The SM/loans page was empty. i opened up SS on my desktop computer with the loans page open. I put the £2700 up for sale from my I-pad. The loan for sale did not even flash up on my desktop. My available balance instantly changed to +£2700. So, from what I saw, my loan part never appeared for sale it was just instantly sold. I'm talking 1 second. The available loans page only updates every 4 seconds. Someone will have refreshed the page manually and bought the part before you even saw it appear. That also probably explains why when something appears on the loans page it's so often just pennies' worth. Someone probably did a manual refresh, saw £123 available, bought £123, and all that was left when the page automatically refreshed for me was the leftover pence. (I wouldn't have thought that people put sub-£1 parts up for sale as often as that happens, but I really don't have a clue how common an occurrence that is.)
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Dec 12, 2015 9:50:25 GMT
(I wouldn't have thought that people put sub-£1 parts up for sale as often as that happens, but I really don't have a clue how common an occurrence that is.) I've done it a few times, to tidy up to round numbers when I've reached my cap on a particular loan, or when jiggery-pokery backwards and forwards has combined with mental miscalculation to leave me a tiny deficit on my balance.
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webwiz
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Post by webwiz on Dec 12, 2015 14:46:16 GMT
I don't know if there are bots or not. What I do know is that parts of the internet are infested with bots, such as poker sites so it would be surprising if there were not any on SS. Even if there are not any just now that does not mean that there will never be any. I have to fill in a captcha on lots of sites which are a lot less sensitive than SS.
What I don't understand is why SS don't put an end to this debate by putting in a captcha (with code to detect aborted attempts). If it irritates people and does not stop any bots it can easily be removed later.
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ablender
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Post by ablender on Dec 12, 2015 16:17:28 GMT
Is there a p2p platform which is currently using captcha?
On unrelated sites, I had problems with captcha in the past; images which were next to impossible to read, characters which can be interpreted as being either or, knowing that I types what I am seeing and the system still does not accept it. I do not think that this will be a step forward.
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Dec 12, 2015 16:56:29 GMT
I don't know if there are bots or not. What I do know is that parts of the internet are infested with bots, such as poker sites so it would be surprising if there were not any on SS. Even if there are not any just now that does not mean that there will never be any. I have to fill in a captcha on lots of sites which are a lot less sensitive than SS. What I don't understand is why SS don't put an end to this debate by putting in a captcha (with code to detect aborted attempts). If it irritates people and does not stop any bots it can easily be removed later. Captchas are just a PITA that don't actually achieve much, since there are several ways around them. captchabot.com/en/ is just the first that comes up on a quick google. On a time-sensitive submission like buying a loan part when demand outstrips supply, it will do nothing but infuriate (irritate isn't anywhere near strong enough) real users in about zero seconds flat.
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webwiz
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Post by webwiz on Dec 12, 2015 17:14:25 GMT
I don't know if there are bots or not. What I do know is that parts of the internet are infested with bots, such as poker sites so it would be surprising if there were not any on SS. Even if there are not any just now that does not mean that there will never be any. I have to fill in a captcha on lots of sites which are a lot less sensitive than SS. What I don't understand is why SS don't put an end to this debate by putting in a captcha (with code to detect aborted attempts). If it irritates people and does not stop any bots it can easily be removed later. Captchas are just a PITA that don't actually achieve much, since there are several ways around them. captchabot.com/en/ is just the first that comes up on a quick google. On a time-sensitive submission like buying a loan part when demand outstrips supply, it will do nothing but infuriate (irritate isn't anywhere near strong enough) real users in about zero seconds flat. The site you specify just has someone else filling it in for you, it's not automatic so not very bot like. The captcha need not be inserted at a time sensitive point, just at log in would be better than nothing (although also easier to get round). Anyway I was really using "captcha" as shorthand for whatever are the state of the art anti-bot measures currently, as I am no longer in the business.
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Dec 12, 2015 17:19:29 GMT
The site you specify just has someone else filling it in for you, it's not automatic so not very bot like. It's automatic as far as the bot's owner is concerned - they can get on with doing other stuff while their bot just regularly refreshes the available loans page and tries to buy any parts that pop up. Unless it's at the time of trying to buy, which is the time-sensitive part, it is utterly pointless. All a bot needs to be is a little script running on a PC. Mr Botty starts his PC up, fires the browser up, logs in to SS, and starts his bot off. Every hour or three, he pops by and checks to see how it's doing. Put a random "Are you still human?" captcha in, and all that needs to happen is that it bings a bong, Mr Botty hears it, switches to that tab/browser/machine, and solve the captcha manually before going back to whatever else he was doing.
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webwiz
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Post by webwiz on Dec 13, 2015 9:31:54 GMT
I was really using "captcha" as shorthand for whatever are the state of the art anti-bot measures currently.
Are you saying that no better defence to bots exists? Obviously if there are any they are not going to be publicised as that would help the bot writers, but I would hope that there is something otherwise the internet is going to lose a lot of its functionality. If there is something I suggest that SS should implement it to settle this argument, and as a protection for the future.
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SteveT
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Post by SteveT on Dec 13, 2015 9:39:22 GMT
I was really using "captcha" as shorthand for whatever are the state of the art anti-bot measures currently.Are you saying that no better defence to bots exists? Obviously if there are any they are not going to be publicised as that would help the bot writers, but I would hope that there is something otherwise the internet is going to lose a lot of its functionality. If there is something I suggest that SS should implement it to settle this argument, and as a protection for the future. Why on earth would SS implement something that instantly would aggravate 99% of their lenders just to "settle" something that very few people seem to be troubled by? If you dislike having to invest time competing for parts on the SM (and plenty of posts on here show that it's perfectly possible to lend substantial sums via the SM) then use pre-funding to invest via the PM instead. That requires almost no effort at all, just a little bit of patience.
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Dec 13, 2015 9:46:07 GMT
Are you saying that no better defence to bots exists? What IS a "bot"? It's just a script, accessing the SS servers in the same way as any browser, that happens to be automated. It might well run within a browser, so look identical to SS as any human user who happens to have quick reactions. So all you can really do is to introduce some kind of manual-intervention check - be that a "type-what-you-see" captcha or something else - at the time of placing the bid. Which, as we know, is time-critical, fastest-finger-first. And any manual-intervention check can be farmed out to a cheap-labour service sooner or later, cheaply and easily.
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webwiz
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Post by webwiz on Dec 13, 2015 9:47:06 GMT
I was really using "captcha" as shorthand for whatever are the state of the art anti-bot measures currently.Are you saying that no better defence to bots exists? Obviously if there are any they are not going to be publicised as that would help the bot writers, but I would hope that there is something otherwise the internet is going to lose a lot of its functionality. If there is something I suggest that SS should implement it to settle this argument, and as a protection for the future. Why on earth would SS implement something that instantly would aggravate 99% of their lenders just to "settle" something that very few people seem to be troubled by? If you dislike having to invest time competing for parts on the SM (and plenty of posts on here show that it's perfectly possible to lend substantial sums via the SM) then use pre-funding to invest via the PM instead. That requires almost no effort at all, just a little bit of patience. A totally transparent anti-bot measure (if it exists) would only aggravate the lenders who use bots. I doubt that that's as many as 99% but if might include those posters on this forum who are implacably opposed to any investigation of bot activity.
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SteveT
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Post by SteveT on Dec 13, 2015 11:21:53 GMT
Captcha and its equivalents are, by definition, intrusive by requiring proof of human operation. If you're hoping for something that prevents bots but requires nothing of human users, I think you may be hoping in vain.
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cooling_dude
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Post by cooling_dude on Dec 13, 2015 11:40:36 GMT
I would imagine that if Bots are present then there'll be bidding on whatever investment appears, no matter the criteria or amount. The user that has set up the bot will then sell investments that he doesn't like and rebalance his books when he gets to his computer.
As such I think that if any one user places more than 5 investments within one hour will need to complete a Captcha before that user can complete the next investment, or any investments after that. This would stop the bots in their tracks, and not be too intrusive to humans.
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