Rampant cheating in the annual university entrance exams have been a headache for Chinese educational ministry for years.
Airborne drones are used this year to fight against cheating in what many Chinese netizens are calling the “strictest exam in history.”
The gaokao, or China’s national college entrance exam notorious for its high stress levels, will see 9.4 million high school students nationwide participating this year. The exams began June 7 and last three days.
The six-propeller drones are being used at the exam centers in the central Chinese city of Luoyang, Henan Province, according to state-run China News. It can fly as high as 500 meters (1640 ft) to detect any suspicious signals sent through devices that may be smuggled into the exam centers.
Each drone costs tens of thousands of dollars, Chinese news reports said.
The drone is much more advanced than the ground monitoring equipments used in the past, said Lan Zhigang, director of Luoyang’s Radio Supervision and Regulation Bureau. The drone can cover a larger area from the air, and can effectively avoid physical obstacles, Lan said.
Students taking the exam in other provinces are also subject to strict security measures.
