Menu
▾
▴
#70 Check SEB integrity
open
5
2021-02-05
2021-02-05
No
There are now many sites and people working on getting around SEB, as shown, for instance, here. Wouldn't it be possible to somehow check the integrity of the SEB application to make sure that it was not altered by the student?
Discussion
You could use a remote management tool to access at least some randomly chosen student computers (so there's a risk being caught if trying to cheat) before the exam and check if they are using the original build of Safe Exam Browser. You can check the code signature in Windows Explorer in the Properties context menu option, see screen shot.
Btw. SEB and an exam system/LMS like Moodle can also check the integrity of the SEB binary, when using the Browser Exam Key. But of course the SEB binary could be manipulated as mentioned in the article you referred, to still send the correct Browser Exam Key even though being hacked. On infrastructre which isn't managed and proctected by the institution (like their own, properly secured computers), you can never be 100% sure about the integrity of the software on it. Obviously when doing BYOD remote exams, you can never provide perfect security by technological means (if any proctoring company promisses that, that's marketing nonsense).
I was thinking that, for instance, with Moodle integration, Moodle itself could some how confirm the seb binary integrity. However, this approach would work only in this kind of environment.