Security tags to keep track of exam cheats

Packages of papers will be tracked using devices similar to those attached to clothes and CDs to ensure none are stolen by unscrupulous pupils or teachers.

As the summer exam season gets underway on Monday, the Edexcel exam board will include the tags with a "significant" number of packages it dispatches to schools and colleges.

Further "micro-texting" technology will allow the board to identify photocopied exam papers. Genuine papers will be given tiny marks only visible under a magnifying glass.

The board revealed it investigated 70 breaches of exam security last year. Some involved teachers who inadvertently opened the exam packages prior to the designated exam date.

Notorious cases of cheating include the theft of maths GCSE papers by teacher Farzana Akbar. She took the papers from Archbishop Lanfranc School in Croydon to help pupils she was tutoring privately but was caught and jailed for three months in 2002.

In 2004, questions from maths and chemistry A-level exams were posted on a website prior to the exam and papers were sold for up to £1,000.

Jerry Jarvis, Edexcel's managing director, said: "Incidents involving stolen papers are extremely rare, but the potential impact is massive.

"The logistics of re-issuing an alternative paper to schools and colleges around the country and re-training markers on the new paper are complicated, costly and could ultimately be detrimental to candidates.

"We're doing a major trial of new techniques and technologies with the aim of deterring potential thefts, enabling us to better identify the source of a lost or stolen paper, and reducing the threat of fake papers being sold to candidates."

Under the system, bags of papers will be fitted with Radio Frequency Identification tags. These will be scanned as the bags are despatched and again after delivery to schools to check whether papers are missing.

These checks will be carried out by compliance officers who are sent out to schools and colleges by the Joint Council for Qualifications, the umbrella body for exam boards. Edexcel says the tags will help the officers identify any bags which have been tampered with.

The board added its online marking system made it easier to spot students who are cheating in exams themselves.

It said nine out of 10 Edexcel papers are scanned, digitised and marked online by examiners, allowing staff to spot candidates who have performed significantly out of line with expectations.

Their paper can then be checked manually for evidence of malpractice.

The online system also makes it easier to spot if a group of students all have the same answers and cheating is suspected.

The board is also developing special security boxes to hold papers until a specified time before each exam. Staff could only unlock them with a secure password.