AI cheating scandal rattles South Korea as annual college exam looms

Fears for national college entrance exam next week as test taker admits sending photos of questions to AI tool

The marks attained by the top scorer ⁠on South Korea’s national exam for aspiring tax accountants this year seemed too good to be true. On Sunday, sceptics were ⁠proven right when he ⁠confessed to ​using generative AI to cheat.

The scandal follows months of speculation after he scored near-perfect marks on hundreds of questions over two exams ⁠taken in April and July. It has also raised the stakes for organisers of South Korea’s annual college entrance exam this Thursday.

“I cheated using ⁠electronic devices and generative AI. My passing the exam with the top score was not ​the result of fair effort,” the candidate said, ‌identifying himself by the ‌surname Han, as he apologised on the YouTube channel Attorney Lee Don-ho.

Han, who ranked first in both rounds of the qualification exam held in April and July, confessed through his lawyer that he used AI to obtain answers during the tests. He said he had cheated by ‌taking photos of the exam questions with a microcamera, sending them to an AI tool and checking the answers on a smartphone.

His score of 397.5 out of 400 points in the first round, with only one wrong answer out of 160 questions, had sparked accusations that he cheated using smart glasses, which he initially denied.

Speaking on camera wearing a face mask, Han said he had submitted a written confession to Seoul police.

The Seoul metropolitan police agency said: “We received a written confession through the test taker’s lawyer this morning regarding cheating on the tax accountant exam,” adding that the case had been assigned to investigators.

The scandal has rattled a ‌country where standardised tests largely dictate social mobility and career trajectories. It comes just days before Thursday’s annual national college entrance exam, ‌a high-pressure event for which many South ​Korean students will have spent much of their lives preparing.

“The presidential office views ​the matter very seriously, and because the college entrance exam is next week, we have been working hard to prepare countermeasures,” a senior presidential office official told reporters on Sunday.

The official said that reports of potential cheating in the certified public accountant exam were concerning, adding ⁠that the presidential chief of staff for policy would convene an emergency meeting later ​in the afternoon to ​address the issue.

The prime minister, Han Seong-sook, acknowledged on Friday public concerns over AI-assisted cheating. The government would “prepare thoroughly in advance and closely oversee the process until the very end to ensure the college entrance exam is conducted fairly and stably”, a statement from her office said.

Reuters and Agence France-Presse contributed to this article