Get the latest tech news
'Ghost' Students are Enrolling in US Colleges Just to Steal Financial Aid
Here's a lesson for today's colleges from the Associated Press. Online classes + AI = financial aid fraud. "In some cases, professors discover almost no one in their class is real..." Fake college enrollments have been surging as crime rings deploy "ghost students" — chatbots that join onlin...
Criminals stole at least $11.1 million in federal, state and local financial aid from California community colleges last year that could not be recovered, according to the reports... Scammers frequently use AI chatbots to carry out the fraud, targeting courses that are online and allow students to watch lectures and complete coursework on their own time... In the past year, investigators indicted a man accused of leading a Texas fraud ring that used stolen identities to pursue $1.5 million in student aid. Maurice Simpkins, president and cofounder of AMSimpkins, says he has identified international fraud rings operating out of Japan, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Nairobi that have repeatedly targeted U.S. colleges...
Or read this on Slashdot
