Chinese AI companies have temporarily paused some of their chatbot features to prevent students from using them to cheat during nationwide college exams, Bloomberg reports. Popular AI apps, including Alibaba’s Qwen and ByteDance’s Doubao, have stopped picture recognition features from responding to questions about test papers, while Tencent’s Yuanbao, Moonshot’s Kimi have suspended photo-recognition services entirely during exam hours.

The increasing availability of chatbots has made it easier than ever for students around the world to cheat their way through education. Schools in the US are trying to address the issue by reintroducing paper tests, with the Wall Street Journal reporting in May that sales of blue books have boomed in universities across the country over the last two years.

The rigorous multi-day “gaokao” exams are sat by more than 13.3 million Chinese students between June 7-10th, each fighting to secure one of the limited spots at universities across the country. Students are already banned from using devices like phones and laptops during the hours-long tests, so the disabling of AI chatbots serves as an additional safety net to prevent cheating during exam season.

When asked to explain the suspension, Bloomberg reports the Yuanbao and Kimi chatbots responded that functions had been disabled “to ensure the fairness of the college entrance examinations.” Similarly, the DeepSeek AI tool that went viral earlier this year is also blocking its service during specific hours “to ensure fairness in the college entrance examination,” according to The Guardian.

We were unable to find any public announcements from the AI companies mentioned, with The Guardian reporting that news around the shutdowns is being driven by students on the Chinese social media platform Weibo. The gaokao entrance exam incites fierce competition as it’s the only means to secure a college placement in China, driving concerns that students may try to improve their chances with AI tools.