Recently, a major cheating scandal has erupted at Yonsei University, one of South Korea's premier educational institutions. The controversy arose during the midterm exam for the course "Natural Language Processing and ChatGPT," a subject taken by around 600 students at the university's Sinchon campus. A significant number of these students are now under suspicion for using AI tools, particularly ChatGPT, to gain an unfair advantage during the exam.

In an effort to maintain academic integrity, the professor opted for an online teaching and examination model. To deter cheating, students were required to keep their screens recorded throughout the exam and submit videos that clearly showed both their hands and faces. Despite these measures, some students managed to bypass the surveillance by strategically adjusting their camera angles or opening multiple browser windows simultaneously.

Upon detecting irregularities suggestive of cheating, the professor issued a statement offering an amnesty: students who voluntarily admitted to cheating would receive a zero on their midterm exam but would not face additional disciplinary action. As of now, the precise number of students involved remains undetermined, though it is estimated that over half of the examinees may have engaged in cheating.

Following the professor's announcement, a poll conducted on the Yonsei University section of a popular college community mobile app revealed that out of 353 respondents, 190 admitted to cheating on the exam. It is widely believed that AI tools, especially ChatGPT, were the primary means by which students cheated.

The rapid rise of AI tools in South Korean universities has caught many institutions off guard, with most still lacking clear guidelines or effective countermeasures to address such incidents of academic dishonesty.