Suspected of cheating on her baccalaureate with an AI, a high school student deprived of her results and her registration on Parcoursup

It's a message that 18-year-old Nina Viriot didn't expect to receive... This Thursday, July 3, she was shocked to discover that a report of suspected fraud had been drawn up against her for the philosophy exam for the baccalaureate.

A message that is not without consequences, since the young high school student will not be able to access her baccalaureate results or even know if she has passed the baccalaureate or not! Another undesirable effect of the report: she is blocked on Parcoursup and cannot validate her registration in a sound engineering school, which had accepted her.

"We didn't expect it at all. Nina was stunned," her mother, Emmanuelle Viriot, told Le Parisien . No supervisor made any comments to her during the tests, and she never signed a report.

The next day, at the Lycée Diagonale (Paris 5th arrondissement), Nina went as requested to obtain information. She was simply told that she could not take the resits. It was only after the school intervened that she learned that the philosophy examiner suspected the use of artificial intelligence to write her paper.

What solutions are there for the future?

Disciplinary proceedings are possible, but in the meantime, she is not entitled to any specific explanation. The decision on whether or not to prosecute rests with the Rector of Paris, Julie Benetti. She must make a decision by July 23.

If a disciplinary committee is convened, Nina will then be able to examine the facts and attempt to defend herself. But the risks are serious: up to five years of disqualification from taking any exam, including driving tests.

An opaque procedure and missing tools

Yet, Nina has a solid academic record. She achieved an average of 16 in philosophy in the second term and 18 in her mock exam. She suffers from attention deficit disorder, receives extra time off, and composes on a computer (without internet or personal files) as stipulated in her personalized support plan.

Her philosophy teacher, Nora Monnet, dismissed the suspicions: "It's a good paper, but not extraordinary. It's worth 13 or 14. She makes reference to a manga, Attack on Titan, which an AI probably wouldn't do." Another colleague saw it as a paper worth 12.

The situation reveals the vagueness surrounding AI detection criteria. The Ministry of National Education maintains that examiners do not have detection tools like those designed to identify texts generated by ChatGPT, and that they are not trained to spot them. However, several academies have asked teachers to report "problematic copies," without explaining the criteria used.

In 2024, 560 baccalaureate candidates were prosecuted for fraud, 5% of them for alleged use of AI. No fewer than 404 students were sanctioned, and 16 of them were banned from taking the exam until 2029.