Scammers using AI to enroll fraudulent students in online classes and then steals financial assistance star-news.press/wp

It was an unusual question coming from a police officer. Heather Brady kicked out at home on Sunday afternoon in San Francisco when the officer knocked on the door to ask: Did she sign up for Arizona Western College?

She hadn’t, and as an officer suspected, someone else applied in Arizona Colleges Community in her name to deceive the government to pay off Financial aid Money.

When she checked her student loan account, Brady saw that scams did not stop there. The loan for over $ 9,000 was paid in its name – but to another person – for courses at the Faculty of California.

“I just can’t imagine how many people happen with that has no idea,” Brady said.

Growth Artificial intelligence and popularity Online classes They led to the explosion of financial aid fraud. False enrollment in colleges have worsened as crime distributed “students of the ghosts” – chatbots to join online classrooms and remain long enough to collect financial aid.

In some cases, professors reveal almost no one in their class is not real. Students are locked from classes that need to graduate as bots push courses due to their enrollment constraints. And victims of identity theft, which reveal loans falsely performed in their names to pass in the months of the Faculties, Federal Office for Students and Loan Services for attempted debt.

On Friday, the US Educational Department introduced a temporary rule Require students to show the colleges of government ID issued to prove their identity. It will only be applied to the first candidates for federal student aid for a summer term that affects about 125,000 borrowers. The agency said that it develops more advanced screening for autumn.

“The scam rate through stolen identities reached the level to emphasize the Federal Program for Assisting Students,” he said in her direction in colleges.

The associated analysis of the preview of the deception of public records received by Colleges California in 2024. 1,2 million false applications reported, which resulted in 223,000 suspicious false enrollments. On other countries they affect the same problem, but with 116 community colleges, California is especially large targets.

The criminals stole at least $ 11.1 million in federal, state and local financial assistance from College California Community that cannot recover, in accordance with the reports.

Colleges usually receive part of loans intended for tuition fees, and the balance that goes directly to students for other costs. The colleges for the community are targeted, because their lower tuition means higher percentages of grants and loans go to borrowers.

Scumeri often use and chatbots to perform fraud, targeting online courses and allow students to watch lectures and complete courses.

In January, Wayne Chaw began to get an email on the class he had never signed in for College de Anza Community, where he took the coding lessons a decade ago. Identity thieves received their social security number and collected $ 1,395 in financial aid in his name.

The energy management class required students to submit homework to prove that they were real. But someone wrote the submissions to a false representation of Chaw, probably using chatbot.

“This person knocks like me, I say my name and surname. … It’s very strange when I saw it,” Chaw said.

The scam included a grant, not loans, so I Chaw did not lose money. He called the Social Security Administration to report identity theft, but after five hours on hold, he never crossed the person.

How Trump’s Administration Moves Remove the Department of EducationFederal cuts can make it difficult to capture criminals and help victims of identity theft. In March, Trump Administration fired more than 300 people From the Federal Office for Students, those inspector services, which investigates deception, has lost more than 20% of their staff through married and pension since October.

“I’m just nervous that I’ll be stuck with this,” Brady said. “The agency will be so malformed and disintegrated that I would not be able to do anything, and I will just be stuck from those $ 9,000 in loans.

Criminal cases across the country offer views of the ethasiveness of the scheme.

In the last year, investigators accused the man accused of leading a cheaper ring in Texas, which used stolen identities to continue 1.5 million dollars in student aid. The second person in Texas said guilty to the name of prisoners of prison prisoners to apply for more than $ 650,000 in student assistance in colleges throughout the south and southwest. And the person in New York recently pleaded guilty of a $ 450,000 student aid crooked in the amount of $ 450,000.

Brittnee Nelson from ShrevePort, Louisiana, brought a daughter in daycare two years ago when she received the notice that her credit score dropped 27 points.

Loans were performed in her name for Colleges in California and Louisiani, she discovered. She canceled one before she was paid, but it was too late to stop a loan of over $ 5,000 for Delgado Community College in New Orleans.

Nelson runs his own business job and didn’t go to college. She was already applied for protection against identity theft and carefully monitor her loan. However, her debt almost entered the collection before the loan was placed in tolerance. She recently got loans with her record after two years of effort.

“It’s like someone entered your house and robbed you,” she said.

The efforts of the Federal Government to verify the identity of the borrowers could help, she said.

“If I can make these obstacles a little harder and have these verifications more visible, I think it’s really, really, he’s really going to protect people in the long run,” she said.

The spokesman Delgada Barbara stated that the responsibility for approving the loan ultimately lies with federal agencies.

“This is an unfortunate and serious thing, but it is not a direct or indirect result of delgadon internal processes,” Waiters said.

In San Francisco, loans performed in Brady’s name are in the Peace period, but still on the books. It was not the only challenge. A few months ago, he was fired from his job and decided to apply for a class at San Francisco City College to help her with her career. But all classes were full.

After a few weeks, Brady could finally apply for a class. The professor apologized for the delay in Seta’s videos: College is fighting fake applications.

___

Education in the joined press gets financial support from several private foundations. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Find APs Standards To work with philanthropy, a list supporters and funded areas of coverage in AP.ORG.