Students using tiny listening devices to cheat in exams

STUDENTS should be subject to airport-style searches before exams, MPs and university bosses have said, amid fears that a growing number are using tiny in-ear devices to cheat.

Official data revealed that “cheat tech” is on the rise, as hundreds of students have been caught with covert technological devices during tests.

found ear pieces for sale on Amazon and eBay under listings which included the words “exam cheat”. They ranged in price from under £50 to around £350.

Following the discovery eBay has said it is withdrawing the listings. Amazon confirmed it was aware it had been selling the devices, but refused to say whether it would remove the products.

The latest versions come with a speaker which is smaller than a grain of rice and sits in the ear, while wirelessly connecting to a device – such as a phone – that can play audio notes.

Wires and sensors are used to connect the tiny speaker to a student’s feet, allowing them to use subtle toe movements to fast forward and rewind.

Neil Carmichael, chairman of the Commons education select committee, called on the Government to introduce a “comprehensive solution”.

He said: “I would say we should be thinking about counter-technology, and random spot checks.

“This trend threatens to undermine our exam system.”

Prof Julia Black, acting director at the London School of Economics, said it was “fiendishly difficult” for university authorities to catch exam cheats.

She called for universities to “do what is necessary” to protect the integrity of exams, even if this meant using more “intrusive” methods.

Baroness Wolf, a cross-bench peer and professor at King’s College London, suggested that universities may have to consider installing airport-style metal detectors.

She said: “If it gets really widespread then students will just have the queue for hours to get in [to exam halls]. The costs of this would be just huge.” Data obtained through Freedom of Information requests has found a 42 per cent rise in cheating cases involving technology over the last four years.

The figure rose from 148 cases in 2012 to 210 in 2016, it showed. In 2016 a quarter of all students caught cheating used electronic devices.

The Department of Education is consulting with universities over how to crack down on cheating students and one possibility is that it could be made a criminal offence.