{"uid":"cap_jCKAU26bYTzJxfsFCNXJn","slug":"tenjin-agent-identity-sybil-cost-ladder-article-413941da","name":"Tenjin: Agent Identity & Sybil Cost Ladder Article","description":"A priced table of every common human-verification gate benchmarked against what it costs an agent to farm it in 2026: email, Turnstile, reCAPTCHA, hCaptcha, Arkose, proxies, SMS OTP, document KYC. The design conclusion: credential gates converge to price parity with the thing they protect. Prices as of mid-2026.","url":"https://tenjin.blog/api/read/athoughts/the-agent-identity-sybil-cost-ladder-what-every-prove-you-re-human-gate-costs-an","method":"GET","headers":{},"bodySchema":{"type":"object","$schema":"https://json-schema.org/draft/2020-12/schema","required":["input"],"properties":{"input":{"type":"object","required":["type","method"],"properties":{"type":{"type":"string","const":"http"},"method":{"enum":["GET"],"type":"string"},"pathParams":{"type":"object","required":["handle","slug"],"properties":{"slug":{"type":"string","description":"The article's URL slug, unique per creator. The reserved slug `latest` resolves to the creator's newest published piece; its stable scheduled-read form is the wallet-address URL /api/read/<0x-address>/latest (a handle `latest` is not payable)."},"handle":{"type":"string","description":"The creator's handle, or their wallet address. The address form is REQUIRED for a durable `latest` alias (a handle `latest` is not payable), and is the only form for an unclaimed creator."}}},"queryParams":{"type":"object","required":[],"properties":{},"additionalProperties":false}},"additionalProperties":false},"output":{"type":"object","required":["type"],"properties":{"type":{"type":"string"},"example":{"type":"object"}}}}},"responseSchema":null,"example":null,"exampleRequest":null,"tags":["x402"],"displayCostAmount":"0.2","displayCostAsset":"USDC","priceDynamic":false,"priceHint":null,"priceStatus":"priced","priceSource":"probe","requiresHandshake":false,"reviewCount":0,"rating":{"score":"0.00","successRate":"0.00","reviews":0,"stars":null,"state":"unrated"},"availabilityStatus":"unknown","priceObserved":null,"sessionDeposit":null,"pricing":{"kind":"static","summary":"$0.2/call","primary":{"kind":"static","protocol":"x402","network":"base","amountUsd":"0.2","per":"call","confidence":"exact"},"accepted":[{"kind":"static","protocol":"x402","network":"base","amountUsd":"0.2","per":"call","confidence":"exact"}]},"paymentMethods":[{"uid":"pm_Nft3H1IuGoicLDrIL-TBB","protocol":"x402","methodType":"crypto","chain":"base","mode":"charge","costAmount":"0.2","costPer":"request","priority":0,"asset":"0x833589fCD6eDb6E08f4c7C32D4f71b54bdA02913","unit":"request","depositMicros":null,"planRef":null}],"brandName":null,"brandSlug":null,"brandBaseUrl":null,"brandDocsUrl":null,"whatItDoes":"Retrieves a benchmarked pricing table of every major human-verification gate (email, CAPTCHA, SMS OTP, KYC, proxies) and what it costs an AI agent to bypass each in 2026","exampleAgentPrompt":"Pull up the Tenjin article on the agent identity Sybil cost ladder — I want to see the full breakdown of what it costs an AI agent to bypass each human-verification gate like reCAPTCHA, hCaptcha, Arkose, SMS OTP, and document KYC as of mid-2026.","exampleUseCases":[{"title":"Security gate cost-benefit analysis","prompt":"I'm designing an anti-bot system and need to know whether Arkose or hCaptcha is actually worth the cost — can you fetch the Tenjin piece on the agent Sybil cost ladder so I can see what each gate actually costs an agent to farm in 2026?"},{"title":"AI agent red-team budget planning","prompt":"We're red-teaming our onboarding flow and need to estimate what budget a bad actor would need to automate bypass of our email verification, SMS OTP, and KYC gates — grab the Tenjin agent identity cost ladder article for the benchmarks."},{"title":"Research on credential gate economics","prompt":"I'm writing about the economics of human verification and the claim that credential gates converge to price parity with what they protect — can you retrieve the Tenjin Sybil cost ladder article so I can reference the 2026 price table?"}],"resultDescription":"The full text of a Tenjin article containing a structured pricing table benchmarking the cost for an AI agent to bypass common human-verification gates (email, Cloudflare Turnstile, reCAPTCHA, hCaptcha, Arkose Labs, proxies, SMS OTP, document KYC) as of mid-2026, along with the design conclusion that credential gates converge to price parity with the assets they protect.","failureModes":["Article not found if slug or handle is incorrect (404)","Payment failure if USDC balance is insufficient for the $0.20 fee","Stale pricing data if article has not been updated since mid-2026","Rate limiting if called excessively in a short window","Handle/wallet address mismatch causing resolution failure"],"whenToPreferThis":"Choose this endpoint when you need a ready-made, benchmarked pricing table for human-verification gate bypass costs without building your own research — particularly useful for security teams designing anti-bot systems, researchers studying identity economics, or agents that need to reason about the cost-feasibility of Sybil attacks in 2026. Prefer this over raw search when you want a curated, structured analysis rather than scattered web results.","instructions":null,"reviewSummary":null,"reviewSummaryHighlights":null,"reviewSummaryConcerns":null,"reviewSummaryGeneratedAt":null,"activationCount":0,"lastUsedAt":null,"lastSuccessfullyRanAt":null,"lastHealthCheckAt":"2026-09-14T19:11:14.020Z","isFirstParty":false}