Professor's Invisible Prompt Trap Catches 32 Students Cheating with AI
Professor's invisible prompt trap catches 32/35 students cheating with AI
I embedded invisible white text instructions in a midterm prompt asking AI to discuss Madagascar. When 32 out of 35 students blindly copied the AI's output, they included nonsensical references to the island nation. Instead of mocking them, I confronted the cheaters and offered a chance to contest their failing grades, though only two attempted to argue their case.
Madagascar floats sideways through the afternoon.
- mvkel
I'm not disputing that students cheat using AI, and that professors catch them and enact consequences.
But this video is a little suspicious. The fact that none of the 32 students bothered to even read the generated output feels strange. Or that those students didn't notice the extremely obvious white text at the bottom of the question when copy/pasting the assignment.
Combined with a TikTok account of a person who is clearly participating in the attention economy, I am skeptical.
- kylenessen
The trap was hidden text instructing the AI to use the word “Madagascar” in a nonsensical way. The assignment was about the Industrial Revolution. “Madagascar wore a toaster to the basketball game” is an example of what a student turned in. The instructor says it was the midterm, but looks like it was more of an online discussion. Anyway, I knew cheating was bad, but this is just flagrant.
- cmiles8
I fear for this generation of folks that are losing the ability to think. They have a very sad existence ahead.
- hatthew
Every few weeks I see a headline about a teacher catching 80%+ of their students cheating with AI. I wonder how much newsworthiness selection bias is taking place here? Out of all teachers that do this type of experiment, do 90% of them them find that most students cheat, or do we just hear about the 1% that have the biggest numbers?
- paxys
“These students have no critical thinking skills!” - large group of adults on HN believing random ragebait on TikTok while applying zero critical thinking.