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Hundreds of WA University students have been caught cheating in exams and plagiarising course work. During the past three years, 545 students have been picked up for plagiarism at Curtin University, 304 at Murdoch, 270 at the University of WA and 182 at Edith Cowan University.

Students from the University of New England may have their degrees stripped from them if they're found guilty of cheating, and may also lose their Australian residency visa. The university has checked more than 200 master projects and found that a significant proportion of fee-paying foreign students had been involved in plagiarism.

The need to sell more courses to foreign students is placing universities' reputations at risk and education is slowly being privatised. To replace the missing income due to fall in government funds, universities allow private students, particularly from overseas to buy university places. The fees overseas students pay can represent up to two-fifths of the budget of universities.