A secret international investigation into job certification test fraud has confirmed long-held suspicions that thousands of people worldwide are cheating on certification exams for coveted jobs.

Cisco Systems Inc. and Pearson VUE, a test administrator, recently conducted a trial run of an anticheating system intended to identify and crack down on "proxy test takers," or people who impersonate others to take exams for them.

Officials at Cisco and Pearson VUE told The Boston Globe that during an eight-month span ended in June 2008, they monitored hundreds of thousands of exams given in eight countries in Asia, Europe, the Middle East and North America. Cisco said it had confirmed that one in 200 of those exams was taken by a proxy, and not the actual enrollee.

Randall T. Trask, a vice president at Pearson VUE says he suspected the numbers were "the tip of the iceberg" because they only measured a limited number of one company's tests. Cisco's exams are given in 4,400 test centers in more than 160 countries, according to Pearson VUE's Web site.

In many white-collar fields, certification tests have taken on growing significance as a prerequisite for many well-paying jobs and proof that employees are maintaining their skills. In the highly competitive technology industry, surveys have shown that technicians with enough certifications can add up to $35,000 to their annual salary.

Cisco has disclosed plans on its Web site about its launch of the new test-security system in all of its worldwide testing locations. Company officials describe it as a combination of measures that Pearson VUE employs in its U.S. testing centers.

The measures include new software that analyzes "data forensics," including tracking a test taker's performance to spot abnormalities, such as answering questions too quickly. Additionally, those taking tests will have their photos taken and digitally stored with their test scores in a database, allowing potential employers to match results with the photo.

Pearson VUE and Cisco will also deploy undercover test takers. Security officials at Cisco and Pearson VUE say the measures will not only allow them to catch individual cheaters but help them determine the scope of the problem.

"It's not just evaluating and being able to stop the people at that location. It was really being able to see more of the global patterns" of cheating, says Erik Ullanderson, head of exam security at Cisco. He says the improved analysis allows Cisco to pinpoint the individuals taking exams under false names around the w


Wardy Landrau
Badge#11509