Catching Exam Cheats With a Spectrum Analyzer

angry tapir writes "Police in Taiwan have used a set of spectrum analyzers to catch at least three people suspected of cheating on an exam by monitoring them for mobile phone signals. Officers used three FSH4 analyzers specially configured by the German manufacturer Rohde & Schwarz to monitor an exam in south Taiwan for prospective government workers."

Comments

Exams in other cultures

[DNS-and-BIND]

I have lived outside our Western culture for a while now, and there is a big difference in the idea of tests and examinations. We have the idea that the test is there to see who is competent to get the job. Simple, right? Nope, it's our own cultural biases that make us think this way. Elsewhere, it's all about getting what comes after the test. Your actual skill is irrelevant, not really a worthy topic of discussion. It's all about the job that you can get, or the university that you can get into, or whatever. The idea that if you don't have the skills then you're not qualified doesn't translate. Eastern cultures have a long history of examinations and take a different view than we do. I know a teacher who, after repeatedly warning against cheating in his class, was fired for daring to catch his students cheating in class. The students lost face, you see, and the teacher (not the students' cheating) was identified as the cause of the problem. True story.

Re:Exams in other cultures

[Anonymous Coward]

I know a teacher who, after repeatedly warning against cheating in his class, was fired for daring to catch his students cheating in class. The students lost face, you see, and the teacher (not the students' cheating) was identified as the cause of the problem. True story.

It's very believable. I just started working in a university in Malaysia. At the start, I found from my colleagues about the pervasiveness of cheating and plagiarism in the university. However, since I found that there was very little guard against cheating, I believed that the students just thought that they would lose out if they do not cheat. That is, the system is at fault here rather than the students.

Hence, I designed my courses to make copying and cheating difficult.

It didn't take long for me to realize that my style of teaching totally bombed on the students. Many did not like it at all. They believed that what I did was "destroying their future" (-exact words they wrote in my evaluation), and they went to the dean to complain about this "most stupid lecturer they have ever seen" (-exact words). Yet another student commented, "you think you are in US or Japan, but this is malaysia" (-exact words).

True story. I only hope that after a few generations, things will start to change.

Re:Exams in other cultures

[DNS-and-BIND]

superiority of Western culture? Where, exactly, did I say that? If you're witch-hunting, you'll probably find a witch. The only mention of superiority is in your own mind. I suppose actually living in the East for so many years has a different view. BTW, Mr. Cultural Blinders, the topic in this thread is tests for government employment so I'm not sure that T.A. experience really applies. Anti-Western hate seems appropriate for an academic, however.

Re:Expensive cheats

[Dayze!Confused]

I live in Taiwan, and at any exam that I have ever attended there is one simple rule. If your cellphone even as much as vibrates while you are taking a test you are disqualified at that moment. We are told this beforehand and are recommended to turn off our cellphones.