Turnitin is the online plagiarism prevention system used by the UK’s Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC). JISC, who provide IT advice to Further and Higher education institutions, was recently forced to issue a press release denying that this particular service was about to be terminated as part of an internal cost-cutting programme.

At present used almost exclusively in UK tertiary institutions, Turnitin has found strong demand from private and government secondary schools in the US and Australia, who need to detect cheating in the submitted coursework of senior students. We anticipate that Turnitin or a similar system will soon be deployed by the UK’s statutory exam boards as well as in many private schools and colleges.

• www.jisc.ac.uk

• www.turnitin.com