--- title: "ChatGPT Could Put People Who Write Essays for Cheating Students Out of Business" description: "With its ability to spit out entire papers in seconds, ChatGPT might seem like a massive problem to the contract cheating industry." date: "2023-09-30" modified: "2023-09-30" authors: - name: "Frank Landymore" job_title: "Contributing Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/flandymore" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/chatgpt-students-cheat-business" categories: - "Artificial Intelligence" - "OpenAI" tags: - "chatgpt" - "the digest" --- # ChatGPT Could Put People Who Write Essays for Cheating Students Out of Business ![With its ability to spit out entire papers in seconds, ChatGPT might seem like a massive problem to the contract cheating industry.]() *Young bored student reading a lecture on laptop during a class at computer lab. \Image: Getty Images\* ## Outcheat the Cheat ChatGPT has become the go-to cheating tool for lousy students. And that potentially means trouble for the essay ghostwriters that cash in on the countless students willing to eschew academic integrity for a better grade, [*The Walrus* reports](). Indeed, OpenAI's blockbuster chatbot — and generative AIs in general — may be the only thing capable of putting a dent in the mammoth cheating industry. Though its legality is dubious and varied, and some countries [have even outlawed the practice](), that hasn't stopped cheating-for-hire from being a stupendously lucrative business. The pandemic solidified its status, during which students depended on these services even more, with one study cited by *The Walrus* finding that contract cheating increased nearly tenfold. During the lockdown, Chegg, the biggest name in the industry, was [valued at a whopping $12 billion](). The cynical commodification of educational institutions, their mounting costs, and their diminishing guarantee of landing alumni jobs despite positioning themselves as a barrier-to-entry into a competitive market may also drive students to do whatever they can to bag a degree. At least, that's according to those in the contract cheating industry. "Colleges are basically businesses," Bruce Ross, who runs the cheating service My Essay Writer, told the *Walrus*. "People look at what we do as a 'no-no' in a moral sense, but they don't really question the ethics of what the school system is doing to a lot of the students, making these promises to them." ## Academic Probation But lazy college students are right to now wonder why they should shell out the extra money for a ghostwritten essay when ChatGPT can now do written assignments for free. To that end, Ross admits that ChatGPT could threaten his business, and said that the recent months have seen a drop in demand. Seemingly confirming this trend, one eyebrow-raising survey conducted by Study.com early on in the ChatGPT craze reported that [89 percent of college students were using ChatGPT]() for homework, and 50 percent to write essays. That figure deserves some scrutiny, however. The results of a full-blown study this year, cited by *The Walrus*, showed that a far fewer 43 percent used ChatGPT for school work, and only four percent actually used the chatbot to write entire assignments. That aside, the tool's [popularity appears to be steadily losing steam](). So, luckily for Ross, perhaps some bespoke cheating will remain old-school. In fact, he believes that if AI detection tools become more sophisticated, more students will turn to his human writers to ensure they don't get caught cheating. That could end up being the case, but available detection tools have [proved to be unreliable at best](). We wouldn't count on it, in other words. **More on ChatGPT:** *[OpenAI May Be in Big Legal Trouble]()* ## Author At Futurism, my work has often centered on bringing a sense of clarity and insight to complex topics ranging from the regulation of emerging technologies to the esoteric ideologies of Silicon Valley executives, while striving not to lose the poetic sense of awe inspired by often-obscure fields like astrophysics and quantum computing. I broke the story of CNET using AI to produce articles that turned out to be riddled with factual errors and plagiarism — a dam-breaking inflection point, as I've reported, that's inspired copycats and endless discourse while beguiling stakeholders ranging from tech giants to purveyors of spam around the web. My work at Futurism has been cited by publications including CBS News, the Los Angeles Times, Vice, Gizmodo, Engadget, the Verge, and Vanity Fair. I grew up in locales ranging from India to China, and now live in the exotic suburbs of Virginia. In my free time, I'm an avid reader of weird sci-fi literature, an aficionado of East Asian cinema, and, regrettably, a relapsed gamer. Allegedly, I’m working on a debut novel, currently untitled. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()