Australian Catholic University (ACU) has faced scrutiny for wrongly accusing students of using artificial intelligence to cheat, basing these allegations on findings from another AI system. This process resulted in professional setbacks for affected students, including a final-year nursing student named Madeleine.
While completing her final-year university nursing placement and actively applying for graduate jobs, Madeleine received an email from the university with the subject line “Academic Integrity Concern.” The correspondence contained an accusation that she had used AI to cheat on an assignment. The situation escalated beyond the initial email. “And on top of that, I was getting emails from the academic misconduct board saying I needed to write out an explanation as to why I think this might have happened,” Madeleine stated. This placed the burden on her to defend her academic integrity at a critical juncture in her education and career launch.
Following the accusation, ACU took six months to clear her name and drop the allegations. Throughout this entire half-year period, a formal notation of “results withheld” was placed on her official academic transcript. This mark served as a significant obstacle during her search for employment. Madeleine identified this delay and the formal status on her transcript as a contributing factor in her failure to secure a graduate nursing position. The extended investigation period directly overlapped with the primary hiring cycle for new nursing graduates, placing her at a distinct disadvantage compared to her peers with clear academic records.
The professional consequences of the university’s protracted investigation were substantial. The inability to secure a graduate position created a significant barrier to entering her chosen profession. “It was really difficult to then get into the field as a nurse because most places require you to have a grad year,” Madeleine explained. The standard career pathway for many newly qualified nurses involves such a program, which provides essential supervised practice and professional development. Left without this opportunity, she faced uncertainty about her future. “I didn’t know what to do. Do I go back and study? Do I just give up and do something that’s not nursing in a hospital?” she said, describing the professional crossroads she faced as a direct result of the unsubstantiated cheating allegation.
Madeleine’s experience was not an isolated incident. The university reported a substantial volume of academic integrity cases, with nearly 6,000 instances of alleged cheating recorded in 2024. Of these cases, approximately 90 percent were specifically related to the use of artificial intelligence. This figure highlights a widespread institutional effort to police the use of AI tools among the student body. The large number of referrals suggests a systemic approach to identifying potential misconduct, which, in turn, affected a significant portion of the student population under review.
In response to these figures, ACU Deputy Vice-Chancellor Tania Broadley asserted that the numbers were “substantially overstated.” While she did acknowledge that there had been an “uptick in referrals for academic misconduct last year,” she did not provide alternative statistics. Broadley also declined to comment on the specific circumstances of students who, like Madeleine, were wrongly accused of academic dishonesty. The university’s official position acknowledged a rise in cases while simultaneously questioning the accuracy of the reported total, without offering clarification on the discrepancy.
The investigative process at ACU required accused students to prove their own innocence. The university’s academic integrity officers issued demands for evidence that were described as invasive. According to emails reviewed by ABC News, students were instructed to submit extensive documentation to support their cases. This included not only their handwritten and typed notes for the assignment in question, which could amount to dozens of pages, but also their complete internet search histories. The university sought this data to verify that students had not accessed AI tools during their work.
The demand for personal data such as internet search histories was met with concern by students, who felt they had little choice but to comply. An ACU paramedic student who was also wrongly accused of AI-related cheating commented on the university’s authority in making such requests. “They’re not police. They don’t have a search warrant to request your search history,” the student stated. Despite this, the student explained the pressure to cooperate was immense. “But when you’re facing the cost of having to repeat a unit, you just do what they want.” This dynamic compelled students to surrender their private data to avoid severe academic and financial penalties.
The university’s accusations were substantially based on reports generated by an AI detection tool from the software company Turnitin. This service has long been used by educational institutions for its plagiarism detection capabilities. However, Turnitin itself provides a specific caution regarding the use of its AI detector. The company’s website states that the tool “should not be used as the sole basis for adverse actions against a statement.” This warning advises against using the AI-generated score as the only piece of evidence in disciplinary proceedings.
The paramedic student who was wrongly accused described the flawed output of the detection tool in practice. The student’s essay was flagged with a high probability of being AI-generated, creating a report that was difficult to contest. “It’s AI detecting AI and almost my entire essay was lit up in blue — 84 per cent of it supposedly written by AI,” the student reported. This firsthand account illustrates the potential for the detector to produce significant false positives, casting doubt on the validity of its findings as standalone evidence.
ACU ultimately ceased its use of the Turnitin AI detector in March of this year. This policy change was implemented after the university had been aware of the tool’s limitations and potential for error for over a year. The decision to discontinue the software came after numerous students had already been subjected to investigations based on its findings. The delay in acting on the known problems with the detection technology meant that the flawed system remained a part of the university’s academic integrity process for an extended period.
Deputy Vice-Chancellor Broadley provided figures on the outcomes of the investigations, stating, “Around one-quarter of all referrals were dismissed following investigation.” She further claimed that “any case where Turnitin’s AI detection tool was the sole evidence was dismissed immediately.” This official account suggests a protocol was in place to quickly resolve cases that lacked corroborating evidence beyond the software’s report. According to this statement, a significant number of cases were filtered out and did not result in a finding of misconduct.
However, the experiences of Madeleine and other students contradict the assertion that cases were consistently dismissed swiftly. Madeleine’s six-month wait before being cleared stands as a direct counterexample to the claim of immediate dismissal. In a further acknowledgment of procedural shortcomings, Broadley admitted that the university’s handling of these cases was not always sufficient. She conceded that “investigations were not always as thorough as they should have been,” recognizing that the university’s process had identifiable flaws.
