A Midwestern tech worker who had risen to become a vice president of IT at a big bank, Bill was set to take a Microsoft certification test to prove his proficiency with the company's Azure platform. Passing the exam would help boost his career, adding another technical certification to his résumé that he could parlay into a raise, or maybe even a higher-paying job.
The rise of exam dumps for tech certifications could have devastating consequences. Tech insiders familiar with the practice say unqualified candidates are using copies of exams for major tech systems and software to land jobs handling sensitive data and mission-critical infrastructure that affect employers and consumers alike.
The popularity of certification tests has exploded in recent years. The research firm IDC estimates that the US market for IT education and training that includes certification tests is now worth $1.4 billion a year.
These fraudulently obtained certifications are not just prevalent but also dangerous, certifications experts who track the use of these exam dumps say. It can be hard to pin direct customer harm on exam dump usage, these experts said, in part because companies are reluctant to admit to that sort of harm — if an employee screws something up, companies are much more likely to just fire them, not launch an investigation into their professional qualifications.
Given how high-tech the industry is, the wave of cheating is surprisingly a low-tech scam. Many of the questions on major technical certification tests are reused for months or even years, so unscrupulous test-takers simply jot down or memorize the exam, type them up afterward, and then post the questions and answers online. Prospective test-takers then pay for access to the completed test and breeze through their own exam.
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