For years, a Romanian degree mill sold fake diplomas all over the world. Every moth $ 2 million had been transferred into a bank account in Cyprus. On the March 5, however, a joint action of US authorities (FTC) and British authorities shut down all the dozen-or-so websites. However it will probably not put them out of business since their main tools are Email spams and clever telemarketing.

Plans for a national body to tackle research fraud have been published by doctors and scientists concerned that foul play is undermining the good name of science. The Committee on Publication Ethics (Cope) agreed at a meeting in October that concerted action was needed.

Japan. Kenya. Mexico. United Kingdom. USA: People from the Kenyan Ministry of Education participated in selling fake diplomas. In the USA and Mexico, students buy term papers and admissions essays online. People propose to take tests for others in China.

Police officers have collected "much new evidence" in the case of an alleged exam-selling ring at Rome's La Sapienza University, the largest university in Europe, the local newspaper Il Messagero reported last week. According to police officers, students paid fees ranging from $1,695 to $ 3,391, depending on the degree of difficulty, to receive oral-exam questions in advance from the faculty member who would test them.

Web-based bogus UK universities appear to be thriving despite the efforts of the authorities to shut them down. UK and US trading standards officials last year closed down 14 websites offering fake British degrees for up £1,000 each. The certificates, from 14 made-up institutions, were said to have been used by hundreds of unqualified people, mainly in North America, to gain jobs in areas such as teaching, computing and childcare.

It is claimed that a "slow corruption" is being installed as universities are struggling for funds. Degrees are for sale and in one university a professor at a former polytechnic was found to have ordered his staff to "minimise" the number of failing students by marking up those at risk of failing because there has been a drop in applications.

The rector of the Moscow State University of Culture and the Arts is alleged to have handed out 130 "false" law degrees between 2001 and 2004 in exchange for bribes worth RUR300,000. Estimates of how much students pay teachers and academics in bribes every year range from RUR250m to RUR300m.