The “GRE General Test at Home” is ETS’s initiative to provide students the opportunity to take the GRE amidst the ongoing pandemic. The service began early last year, and according to ETS, it is here to stay. As far as the test contents are concerned, the home-based version of the test is identical to the test taken at test centers worldwide. The test is administered through a desktop computer or a laptop, and a webcam, either internal or external, is used for live monitoring.
As you can imagine, it didn’t take long for people to wonder if there are ways to cheat the system. You can see this question being asked by concerned test-takers on different forums who are afraid that their scores will be undermined by those who have found ways to cheat on their tests.
In this Article
How does the “GRE Test at Home” work?
The home-based test is available in all the countries except for Iran and Mainland China. It is administered through software that you have to download beforehand called “Proctor U.”
The way it works is that you are monitored live via webcam by a human proctor who asks you to show them your room, table, and everything else in your vicinity before starting the test.
You are not allowed to have anyone else in the room at any time during the test. You are to wear appropriate clothes so that nothing covers your ears and eyes. You cannot take notes on a simple paper for security reasons. Instead, you are to use a whiteboard with an erasable marker or a transparent sheet protector with an erasable marker.
In addition to a computer and a webcam, you are also required to have a Speaker (Headphones/earphones are not allowed) and a microphone (Can be internal or external).
ETS claims that in addition to the live monitoring, the software uses AI to tell if you open your browser at any time or open some other third-party app during the test.
Is it possible to cheat on “GRE Test at Home”?
Unfortunately, yes, it is. Not only is it possible, but it is also relatively easy for anyone with a bit of creativity. However, more discreet methods require the use of technology and additional hardware (that can be easily acquired for cheap), which can give fraudulent test-takers a better success rate with minimal risks. I do not want this article to be a “how-to” for those seeking to cheat; hence I will not mention those methods.
So how can you cheat? Well, it’s quite simple. At the beginning of the test, the proctor will ask the test-taker to show them their room, and sure enough, the test-taker will show them the room, and no one is there besides the test-taker. However, what is stopping anyone from entering the room once the test starts? As far as I know, there is no requirement to position the camera so that the room’s entrance door is in sight at all times.
Even if there is such a requirement, what if a room has multiple entrances? What if someone is hiding in the washroom or the cupboard, which sure enough will not be in the view of the camera. You cannot cover the entire room with a single camera, and hence the whole live-monitoring system falls right down on its face.
Okay, so you are wondering to yourself that sure a test-taker can manage to have someone in the room, but how will they help? Well, all they would need to do is to sit out of the view of the camera. They can use their mobile phone to take pictures of the laptop/computer display without bringing the phone into the camera’s FOV (field of view).
This is where anyone with a little bit of camera knowledge and creativity can figure out beforehand how much of an area their webcam covers. What is even worse is that a person can intentionally purchase an external webcam with the lowest field of view capability so that the camera can only show their face and nothing else.
Now that the proctor has no reason to think that there is someone in the room other than the test-taker, the “helper,” as mentioned earlier, can take pictures of the display at just the right angle as not to get caught. Once they have the picture, they can read the questions, figure out the answer and write it down on a piece of paper and slide it on the table just enough so that the test-takers peripheral vision can pick it up.
Remember, the GRE is a multiple-choice test, and there are no detailed step-by-step answers required for the math section. All a person needs are the correct answer choice, and that’s it.
Moreover, it’s not as if those willing to cheat will not put in the time to rehearse their tactics beforehand. They absolutely will. This is such an easy system to cheat that it boggles my mind how ETS is fine with this.
Not to mention the myriad of other ways to make the whole process a lot easier and risk-free.
Wouldn’t this article show people how to cheat?
This is a legitimate question, and I asked it myself too while I was writing this article. The truth of the matter is, I did not say anything that is not obvious to anyone to begin with. Even if someone doesn’t figure this out personally, there are already multiple posts on Reddit forums where people are discussing this, and it’s just a Google search away.
The point of this article is to shed light on how vulnerable the “GRE at Home” test is. It is not fair to those who have worked for months to prepare for the examination and acquire a legitimate score when they easily cheat the system.
If you think it is not happening, then feel free to search for it; you will find multiple stories of people talking about their friends who have successfully bypassed the system and achieved a high score.
ETS must address this issue and come up with a more secure system or halt their at-home service altogether because certain people will always find a way to cheat the system.
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