ABSTRACT
Cheating is different now. Students have access to a sophisticated global online marketplace of hardware, software and services, all promising to give them an edge in their studies. Through social media influencers, sponsored content and advertising, cheating is aggressively pushed to students. New modes of cheating such as homework-solving apps and auto-paraphrase tools sit alongside turbocharged versions of traditional cheating like paying someone else to write your assignments. Websites where students share answers to their homework can flourish into publicly-traded multi-billion-dollar companies. New modes of assessment including online exams provide new opportunities for cheating, and new approaches to detect and deter cheating. But most importantly, the rate at which new cheating approaches are being developed and shared continues to accelerate. This chapter focuses on ‘e-cheating’, defined as ‘cheating that uses or is enabled by digital technology’. A taxonomy for e-cheating is proposed that focuses on the unique affordances of different types of e-cheating. The chapter also provides a roadmap for reading the rest of the book.
