http://www.asiaone.com/Digital/Features/Story/A1Story20070523-8289.html
Fake degrees
I RECEIVED TWO degrees last week. One is an associate's degree in criminal justice, while the other is a bachelor's degree in journalism, and it only took me less than a week to get them.
With these two degrees, I can, technically, begin applying for jobs as a police officer or a journalist, either of which will pay much more than my current position as an intern. For sure.
If you haven't guessed by now, the degrees are fake. The associate's degree from Belford University cost US$349 (S$536) and the replica bachelor's degree from TrueDiplomas cost US$137.90. Total: $748, excluding freight charges by DHL.
The Belford degree package is impressive. Apart from the qualification itself, the package also included educational transcripts with my grades for each module. The university seal is embossed and looks authentic.
The replica degree, however, is disappointing. There are glaring spelling and grammatical errors, for example, December was spelled as 'Decemberf'. (See photos on facing page.) Comparing it to the real McCoy from my colleague, the replica did have the same font, though there were slight differences in the content.
The paper size was also much smaller, though the website offered several paper sizes. (Being Singaporean, I chose the cheapest - A4).
Although the two documents were fairly easy to obtain, fake degrees do not appear to be a big issue in Singapore - yet. Over the last decade, there have been only six reported cases of degree frauds here. (See page 6, 6 Cases In Past Decade In Singapore)
The same cannot be said for other countries, though. In the United States, fake degree scams are so rampant that the problem is seen as a threat to national security. An audit as early as May 2004 revealed a total of 463 employees in the federal government had phony academic papers. Some were high-ranking officials in sensitive positions with top security level clearance.
According to degree mill expert John Bear, co-author of Degree Mills: The Billion-dollar Industry That Has Sold Over A Million Fake Diplomas, more than 300 active degree mills are selling thousands of fake degrees each week, with annual sales exceeding US$500 million. There were no authoritative figures for Singapore.
Mr David Ang, executive director of the Singapore Human Resource Institute, told Digital Life that fake degrees are not 'epidemic' here. He noted that degree cheats are usually foreign, buying these degrees overseas and then trying to use them in Singapore.
'People use fake degrees to apply for jobs which require soft skills, such as management positions, where their lack of knowledge is not so evident,' he added. He also said that companies here do conduct checks on the qualifications on their employees.
However, a poll of 10 randomly chosen local companies did not bear this out. Out of the 10 companies, only three were aware of fake degrees, and only one said they were able to identify them.
A human resource professional working at a local health care company said that no in-depth checks were conducted on the qualifications of their job applicants. She also did not know which relevant authorities to contact to authenticate a degree.
Even companies which do conduct checks may not be able to sieve out the deceptions altogether.
Ms Tammy Tan, group corporate communications officer for ComfortDelGro, told Digital Life that the qualifications of all job applicants, including those applying for executive postions, are checked by directly calling up the universities.
But such a method may not work against some degree mills, which provide verification services, said executive search firms. Employers who call them are told that the applicant is indeed a graduate from the school and assured of the good standing of the university.
Interestingly, the one company which did conduct adequate checks, Garner International, has encountered two cases of degree fraud here. The two applicants had applied for the account manager and sales executive positions at the executive search firm. Mr Brian Huntley, the regional director of the firm, encountered both cases after he started working here three months ago. Prior to working in Singapore, he was based in Australia where he also encountered cases of degree fraud.
Noted the executive, who specialises in placing IT personnel: 'They are usually in their mid-twenties to early thirties, (the time) when a person is trying to build a career and open doors to better jobs.'
While the degree-for-sale scam has not hit syndicate level, HR consultants say they are always wary of such bogus qualifications.
Mr Jagjit Gill, senior manager of operations at Kelly Services, said: 'In some of our operations in other countries, (fake degrees) can be a problem. We have had to reject and blacklist some applicants.'
Ms Annie Yap, CEO of the GMP Group, also said that the agency frequently encounters applicants who lie about their curriculum vitae.
As a result, recruiters actively screen the qualifications of their applicants. They also watch out for tell-tale signs such as mismatching qualifications for the job in question. For example, a Harvard graduate applying for an entry-level job.
However, not all degrees obtained online are fraudulent. Some accredited universities do offer online degree courses, Harvard University being one of them. However, the professional websites and sales pitches of degree mills can deceive prospective students as well, a fact acknowledged by Dr Michael Goldberg, chief academic officer of U21Global, a Singapore-based institution offering accredited online degree courses.
'It is important for prospective students to research carefully who is providing any educational programme in which they want to enrol,' he told Digital Life in an e-mail interview. 'As with all products and services, caveat emptor!'
Additional reporting by Tham Yuen-C
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