Needless to say how much important is the safety of your website. The service that is widely known and combines security with ease of use is reCAPTCHA. It is a free service of Google that protects your website from spam and abuse.
ReCAPTCHA is easy to be used, but it is hard to be managed by automated malicious software. Convert Forms extension includes reCAPTCHA v2 (checkbox and invisible) and you can configure it with just a few steps.
Add Checkbox reCAPTCHA v2 to Joomla Forms
The "I'm not a robot" Checkbox requires the user to click a checkbox indicating the user is not a robot. This will either pass the user immediately (with No CAPTCHA) or challenge them to validate whether or not they are human.
Generate reCAPTCHA Keys
To generate the required keys, you will have to login into your Google account by visiting the Admin Console: https://www.google.com/recaptcha/intro/v3.html
Click on the Admin Console button.
After logging in, you will have to click on the + (Plus) button to register a new site.
After clicking the + (Plus) icon you will be redirected to add a new Site and after you fill in all fields, you will be able to copy your API keys.
Completing the following fields, you will have the required keys that you need to include in your website so that you can enable the service.
- Set your Site's Name in the Label field
- Choose the reCAPTCHA v2 "Im not a robot" Checkbox from the reCAPTCHA type
- Add your domain name
- Accept the reCAPTCHA Terms of Service
- Click on the SUBMIT button
Your keys are ready! The Site key and the Secret key are what you need.
In Joomla administration environment click on Global Configuration -> Convert Forms and click on the "reCAPTCHA" tab.
Here is where your keys must be placed. Fill in both "Site key" and "Secret key" fields using the corresponding keys that Google has provided you.
Next, go to the main administration menu: Components -> Convert Forms -> Forms.
And choose the form you want to edit.
Choose the tab "Add Field" and click on the reCAPTCHA field in the Advanced Fields category. Save your work.
Subsequently, more options about appearance are given where you can optionally choose the reCAPTCHA theme and size in the respective field options.
reCAPTCHA v2 comes with the Light and Dark themes and in a Normal and Compact size as you can see in the screenshot below:
Finally, after all the changes save your work. Your reCAPTCHA field is ready!
To improve performance and avoid duplicate script calls, Convert Forms, relies on the Joomla reCAPTCHA plugin scripts to render the reCAPTCHA widget.
Add Invisible reCAPTCHA v2 to Joomla Forms
The invisible reCAPTCHA does not require the user to click on a checkbox, instead it may display a challenge to the user if it detects any spam behavior when a user submits your form.
Generate reCAPTCHA Keys
To generate the required keys, you will have to login into your Google account by visiting the Admin Console: https://www.google.com/recaptcha/intro/v3.html
Click on the Admin Console button.
After logging in, you will have to click on the + (Plus) button to register a new site.
After clicking the + (Plus) icon you will be redirected to add a new Site and after you fill in all fields, you will be able to copy your API keys.
Completing the following fields, you will have the required keys that you need to include in your website so that you can enable the service.
- Set your Site's Name in the Label field
- Choose the reCAPTCHA v2 Invisible reCAPTCHA badge from the reCAPTCHA type
- Add your domain name
- Accept the reCAPTCHA Terms of Service
- Click on the SUBMIT button
Your keys are ready! The Site key and the Secret key are what you need.
In Joomla administration environment click on Global Configuration -> Convert Forms and click on the "reCAPTCHA" tab.
Here is where your keys must be placed. Fill in both "Site key" and "Secret key" fields using the corresponding keys that Google has provided you.
Next, go to the main administration menu: Components -> Convert Forms -> Forms.
And choose the form you want to edit.
Choose the tab "Add Field" and click on the reCAPTCHA Invisible field in the Advanced Fields category. Save your work.
Subsequently, more options about appearance are given where you can optionally choose the reCAPTCHA badge in the field options.
reCAPTCHA v2 Invisible comes with the Inline, Bottom Right and Bottom Left badges as you can see in the screenshot below:
Finally, after all the changes save your work. Your reCAPTCHA Invisible field is ready!
Add reCAPTCHA v3 to Joomla Forms
The reCAPTCHA v3 Field is on our roadmap and is currently not available. Once its available, this section will be updated with a guide to let you add the Field to your Forms.
Why you probably don’t need Google reCAPTCHA
Without you having to do a thing, Convert Forms is already protecting your forms from spam submissions. A honeypot field is automatically added to each form by default. It's designed to catch spammers in the same way an actual pot of honey would catch flies. It's just a hidden field placed into every form and it's purpose is to make form submission fail if anything is entered into it.
Read more here: Native Convert Forms Anti-spam Protection with Honeypot
Tips:
- Don’t forget to store your keys.
- Different versions of reCAPTCHA have different keys.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does this require the Joomla plugins "CAPTCHA - reCAPTCHA" or "CAPTCHA - Invisible reCAPTCHA" to be enabled?
Convert Forms reCAPTCHA fields do not require the Joomla core reCAPTCHA plugins to be enabled and configured
