BEIJING:
Eight Chinese parents and teachers, who used high-tech gadgets such
as mobile phones and wireless earpieces to help children cheat at
university entrance exams, have been jailed.
The eight, who were found guilty of illegally
obtaining state secrets on Tuesday, were given sentences of six
months to three years, Chinese media reported yesterday.
The cheating took place in 2007 in the wealthy eastern province
of Zhejiang, with the parents and teachers operating in three
groups.
The parents, some of them local officials, got together to plot
how to help their children as 'they knew their academic
achievements were not ideal', the official Legal Daily said.
One group of parents managed to bribe a teacher to fax them the
questions once the exam got under way. They also engaged six
university students, who were put up in a hotel room which
functioned as the 'headquarters', to answer the questions.
The answers were then sent via mobile phones to their children
in the exam hall who were wearing tiny earpieces, reported the BBC
citing Chinese reports.
Another parent employed even more high-tech equipment. He bribed
a student taking the same exam as his son to get him the questions
using a miniature scanner, according to the BBC report.
To make sure that his child could pass with flying colours, he
had nine teachers on standby to answer the questions.
A third scam involved a school teacher who had charged hundreds
of dollars to get the answers to students. But the answers were not
transmitted successfully because of technical glitches.
The cheats were discovered after police detected 'abnormal radio
signals' near the school, said the Legal Daily. The reports did not
say what happened to their children.
