The Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Paris, one of France’s top universities, has banned the use of ChatGPT, an artificial intelligence-based chatbot that generates coherent articles or essays, to prevent fraud and plagiarism, according to Reuters.
ChatGPT has a free version of the program that can generate raw text on almost any topic, including articles, assignments, jokes and even poetry, based on prompts, raising concerns about plagiarism across industries.
The university said Friday that it had sent an email to all students and faculty announcing a ban on the use of ChatGPT and all other artificial intelligence-based tools at the Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Paris.
“In the absence of a transparent reference, students may not use the software to produce any written work or presentation under the supervision of the course director, except for specific course purposes,” the Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Paris said, without specifying how users would be tracked.
ChatGPT has already been banned in some public schools in New York City and Seattle, and several U.S. universities have announced plans to reduce home assessments and increase handwritten essays and oral exams, according to U.S. media reports.
The Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Paris, whose main campus is in Paris, added that penalties for using the software could be as severe as expulsion from the school, or even from the entire French higher education system.
“The ChatGPT software is raising important issues for educators and researchers around the world regarding fraud in general and plagiarism in particular,” it said.
Microsoft’s recent announcement of further multibillion-dollar investments in OpenAI (the very AI research lab behind ChatGPT) builds on its bet on OpenAI nearly four years ago, when Microsoft put $1 billion into it, which was co-founded by Tesla CEO Elon Musk and investor Sam Alterman in OpenAI was co-founded by Tesla CEO Elon Musk and investor Sam Altman in 2015.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently said that OpenAI will develop ways to help schools identify AI cheating. But he warned that there is no guarantee that cheating will be fully detected.
