By Sharon Lam October 8, 2017
CHENGDU, CHINA – FEBRUARY 25: (CHINA OUT) A policeman displays fake seals, diplomas and other certificates they seized from illegal producers at a building on February 25, 2005 in Chengdu of Sichuan Province, China. Police have arrested three people suspected of counterfeiting certificates after days of investigation. (Photo by China Photos/Getty Images)
In 2010, former president of Microsoft China Tang Jun, had his PhD from Pacific Western University called into question. Investigators found that not only was Pacific Western an unaccredited institution, but that his diploma had cost him $2,595 in tuition, and required no classroom instruction. A year later, legions of other high-ranking senior executives were, perhaps somewhat embarrassingly, caught up in widespread “degree scams”— dubious programmes offering enrollees credentials like PhD certificates for minimal, if any, academic work. The practice of academic forgery, where degrees from unaccredited or fake institutions are sold to customers both witting and unwitting, has long been popular among unscrupulous students in China, but is relatively new to the upper echelons of its business world.
Though not a uniquely Chinese phenomenon, a quick scroll through Chinese search engine Baidu reveals how easy it is to buy counterfeit certificates from websites like Yuhongzp and PhonyDiploma on the mainland. A fake diploma from The University of Hong Kong, for instance, costs only $250, and allows users to customize everything from the watermark to the quality of the paper stock (“aged,” “eggshell” or “cream” are all options).
More at: How Blockchain Can Stamp Out China’s Fake Diplomas – Forbes Asia #NewTech
