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In the book "Corruption in Higher Education: Global Challenges and Responses," 34 experts shed light on various corruption issues in higher education: contract cheating and outsourcing assignments; ambivalent hiring processes; fake universities that take various forms, from profit-driven schemes to students buying degrees without fulfilling obligations; corruption research involves scholars, administrators, and agencies, united against academic corruption. Future steps include integrity theory development, examining secondary education's impact, leveraging technology, avoiding social group stigmatization, and fostering global cooperation.

African ghost-writer claims to have written hundreds of papers for New Zealand students while allegedly working for Eastern China-based academic essay writing service Assignment Joy. The anonymous whistle-blower alleges that some New Zealand students graduated without ever writing a single assignment. Urgent talks are ongoing between New Zealand universities and the Government to follow Australia’s move, outlaw cheating websites and block them from local access.

According to an associate professor at the University of Calgary, the rate of academic misconduct during the pandemic rose from 38% to over 200%. Students who use the services of companies to write essays or complete assignments for them are often extorted. Companies continue to charge their credit cards, threatening to report them to their schools if they try to seek help.

According to a report at the Thompson Rivers University, the number of academic integrity cases has doubled. They include 514 incidents of plagiarism, 342 incidents of cheating, 5 incidents of fabrication and 347 incidents of academic misconduct for 1,208 cases recorded from September 2019 to August 2020. 80 students have been subject to suspension by November 2020.

While the Academic Integrity Policy has not changed since the transition to remote learning at Rutgers faculty, departments have implemented new measures in an effort to prevent cheating. The Office of Student Conduct has created tutorial videos on completing work honestly, and on exams and major assignments, students should write and sign an honour pledge. The policy includes seven types of violations: plagiarism, cheating, and fabrication, facilitation of dishonesty, academic sabotage, violation of research or professional ethics and violations involving potentially criminal activity.

A systemic study by Frontiers in Education in 2014-2018 found that 15.7% of university students commit contact cheating. In total, this potentially represents 31 million people. Meanwhile, the number of blackmail cases has increased as well. Research in the UK shows that 31% of the essay mills use misleading advertising and the majority do not guarantee content that meets the passing grade. To tackle contract cheating a joint effort is needed from legislatures, students, and professors.

The Office of Student Rights and Responsibilities hearing board found 34 undergraduates and 27 graduate students to violate academic integrity guidelines. According to academic integrity experts, graduate students are more likely to make accidental citation mistakes, while undergraduates are more inclined to directly copy information from other sources or purchase essays to pass off as their own. Officials put undergraduates who fall below the 2.0 GPA threshold under academic probation, and graduate students cannot receive a degree with a GPA of less than 3.0.

Universities in the USA use a variety of approaches to combat cheating, from advanced plagiarism detection software, legal action against companies offering paper-writing services to interviews with students suspected of contract cheating. In Canada, the Academic Integrity Council of Ontario brings together college officials twice a year to share best practices. Australia and New Zealand have similar legislation in place: prison sentences up to two years and heavy fines.

Between 2014 and today, 15.7% of US students admit to paying someone else to undertake their work. Schools such as Georgia Tech (GT), have launched their own weapon in the war on contract cheating, a bot. The GT bot, named Jack Watson, infiltrates cheating sites posing as a for-hire writer and homework cheater. When a GT student picks the bot to do their work, the bot sends the student a professor-crafted assignment with a secret “watermark.” Nine students who submitted the work with the scarlet letter have already been caught.