Bot protection
Is Friendly Captcha GDPR compliant?
Friendly Captcha may run before the visitor has agreed, because it does not store or read anything on the device that goes beyond what is strictly necessary. It still belongs in your privacy policy.
- Category
- Bot protection
- Needs consent
- No
- Leaves the EEA
- No
- Can be self-hosted
- Yes
- Recognised by
- friendlycaptcha.com
What does Friendly Captcha do?
A German challenge that solves a cryptographic puzzle in the background instead of profiling the visitor. Hosted in the EU and self-hostable, it is the option with the fewest questions attached.
Does Friendly Captcha need consent?
No consent is needed for Friendly Captcha on its own, because it does not store or read anything on the device beyond what is strictly necessary. That is not a free pass: it must still be named in your privacy policy, and the request itself still reveals the visitor's IP address to the provider.
Does Friendly Captcha send data outside the EEA?
No. Friendly Captcha keeps processing inside the EEA, which removes the third-country question entirely. You still have to name it as a recipient in your privacy policy.
How do we detect Friendly Captcha?
We load your page in a real browser as a first-time visitor who clicks nothing, then look at what it contacted. Friendly Captcha is recognised by requests to friendlycaptcha.com, and we report whether it merely loaded or actually sent data, and whether it set a cookie before any choice was made.
Check your websiteThis describes the service as it is normally deployed. Your own configuration decides what actually happens, which is what a scan of your site shows. Not legal advice.