1 Software Development Marketplaces Implications for Plagiarism Daryl D’Souza Margaret Hamilton Michael Harris School of Computer Science & IT, RMIT University

17 Nov 2006MCEC A timely reminder …. “Caught red-handed: Buy-an-essay is the latest cheating ploy offered on the internet as universities wage a war on plagiarism ” Author: Elisabeth Tarica The Age, Education supplement 13 November 2006

17 Nov 2006MCEC What prompted this study?  Offshore (Singapore) –Per chance search by colleague showed up Rentacoder site contained their assignment specification  Australia –Notified by UK academic –Used relatively significant resources to track student –Site used by student: Rentacoder  Current RMIT procedure did not help –premised on copy-detection

17 Nov 2006MCEC Current RMIT CS&IT Procedure  Copy-detection supported by jplag –very effective for code copy-detection –freely available  Procedure: –jplag all submissions –determine interviewees list –Interview (use jplag evidence) –apply penalty, if any

17 Nov 2006MCEC jplag example

17 Nov 2006MCEC jplag example (contd)

17 Nov 2006MCEC RentACoder Website RentACoder Website

17 Nov 2006MCEC Software Buyers

17 Nov 2006MCEC Ratings for work done

17 Nov 2006MCEC Request for Assignment Support “I’m looking for coder to help me doing homework’s. (for other students)”

17 Nov 2006MCEC Perfect Bider [sic] “Age Students with good grades and knowledge. Please send examples of your homewords, (with assignments.)” Perfect Bider [sic] “Age Students with good grades and knowledge. Please send examples of your homewords, (with assignments.)”

17 Nov 2006MCEC Contacting other party outside of site is a violation of both software buyer and seller agreements.

17 Nov 2006MCEC Features of SDMs Features of SDMs SDM sites that we visited offered: Free (for buyer) but compulsory registration Free (for buyer) but compulsory registration Request for software development services Request for software development services Search for services and developers Search for services and developers Safepay transactions (typically ESCROW) Safepay transactions (typically ESCROW) Feedback/Ratings forums Feedback/Ratings forums

17 Nov 2006MCEC Preventive solutions  Workshops –Every semester in O-Week –Academic Integrity  Demonstrations –Specific, in context of pracs –Staged  Mentoring –RMIT LEAD initiative –Tried successfully in Business –Being trialled in Programming Techniques

17 Nov 2006MCEC Conclusions  SDM-based plagiarism needs to augment procedures & workshops to (1) secure stronger evidence and (2) spread greater awareness about sourcing solutions: –Breach of copyright, for posting university documents without due permission from the author, and –Plagiarism, unless the work of the successful bidder is acknowledged :-)  Technical solutions needed: –Central IT support to monitor access to SDMs –Versioning (CVS) –Validation against turnitin for code –Search sites soon after submission  Preventive solutions are essential.

17 Nov 2006MCEC What next?  Do demos and mentoring help to improve results and reduce plagiarism (of all forms)?  Are there feasible technical solutions such as software agents to monitor (selected) sites for (selected) courses/subjects?  Some quotes to keep in mind: –“The single most important attribute of a graduate is that they have a highly developed respect for academic integrity” Professor Peter McPhee, University of Melbourne –“Occasionally people are going to do the wrong thing and get away with it. What you can do is reduce the incidence and try to change the overall behaviour” Professor Justin Zobel, RMIT university