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Understanding Academic Integrity and 21st Century Perspectives on
Plagiarism and Copy Right Infringement
By
Nwaogu Oguchinalu Humphrey1 & Ozonuwe Opene Sunday 2
Crawford University, P.M.B 2001, Faith City, Igbesa, Ogun State, Nigeria.
Corresponding author’s email: nwaoguhumphrey@crawforduniversity.edu.ng
Tel: +234 (0)8069051140
Abstract
This study was motivated by the alarming rate of academic dishonesty, plagiarism and copy
right infringement practices within the academic environment. The writers have examined the
situation of academic dishonesty within the cycle and have seen that the rate of academic
misconduct in higher institutions of learning is quite disheartening. Experiences have also
shown that in every corporate organization, there is an acceptable standard, a corporate
culture or code of conduct that must be upheld. Things are not just done anyhow in an
academic environment. Also it is observed that most students, staff and faculty members have
a vague sense of what academic integrity means. The writers have unequivocally discussed
this topic in the following format: types of academic fraud and dishonesty, plagiarism, reason
for plagiarism, types of plagiarism, penalties for plagiarism, how to detect plagiarism,
common ways to avoid plagiarism, copyright law, copyright infringement, types of copyright
infringement, examples of copyright infringement, penalties for copyright infringement. The
authors recommended that disciplinary committee should setup to try offenders and
perpetrators of evil must be brought to book and if found guilty, he or she must be punished
according to the gravity of their offences as stipulated in the hand book or condition of
service without fear of favour, secondly, the body that regulate higher institutions of learning
such National Universities Commission (NUC), National Board for Technical Education
(NBTE), National Commission for Colleges of Education (NCCE) should display high level
of integrity and transparency while discharging their duties among others. They concluded
that academic environment is where intellectual minds are expected to be trained. Therefore
administrators of academic environment must adopt all necessary measures to ensure that
academic fraud and dishonesty are eliminated from the system
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Introduction
In every corporate organization, there is an acceptable standard, a corporate culture or code of
conduct that must be upheld. Things are not just done anyhow in an academic environment.
Experiences have shown, that most students, staff and faculty members have a vague sense of
what academic integrity means. Every members of academic community therefore must
know the importance of academic integrity. Every discipline whether in liberal arts, social
sciences, natural sciences, technology and engineering has their standard and code of ethics.
However, the question at this point is what is integrity? And what does it look like in
practice? How do a student, lecturers and researchers gain proficiency in it?
The word integrity in English was derived from the Latin words “integer” and “integritas”
which means whole or entire, integrating different parts of one‟s true self (Macfarlane,
Zhangb and Pun (2014). Integrity is often used as a synonym for honesty; it connotes
wholeness, purity, and coherence. In specific discipline, integrity is often defined in the
statement of professional ethics and they are related to transparency, honesty, competence,
and accountability. In the field of arts and humanities, integrity connotes originality; in the
natural sciences it means reproducibility. From a legal point of view, Fjellstrom (2005)
suggested that “integrity may be further interpreted as the possession of certain rights, such as
those associated with being a citizen or owning property”. Macfarlane, Zhangb and Pun
(2014) stated that “one should not violate the integrity of a person‟s privacy or private
property”. They further added that “integrity can be understood as respecting the intrinsic
worth of each individual and their human dignity”. In a broader sense, academic integrity has
to do with both aspects of research integrity, ethical understanding and skills required for a
researcher to carry out research work without violation of laws in local, international, and
global cycles. Violation of acceptable standards and code of ethics in carrying out academic
duties and research works in academic environments is referred to as academic fraud and
dishonesty.
Cases of academic fraud and dishonesty have become very rampant in recent years as
perpetrators have adopted the use of computer technologies and internet in executing their
mission. In other words, when we talk about academic fraud and dishonesty, we are referring
to hidden agendas and activities of the students, staff, administrators and faculty members
that contravenes the acceptable standards and corporate code of ethics in academic
environment. Denisova-Schmidt (2016) “academic misconduct with the students‟
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involvement, includes various types of cheating, such as plagiarism and attending classes or
sitting for examinations on another student‟s behalf (impersonation), as well as services,
gifts, informal agreements, or payments in exchange for admission, grades, advance copies of
examinations and tests, preferential treatment, graduation, and sham degrees”. Denisova-
Schmidt et al (2016) added that in some cases, “university staff and administration violate
academic integrity by ignoring the students‟ misbehavior, selling admissions, manipulating
accreditation, or creating degree mills”. Also, Denisova-Schmidt and de Wit (2017) added
that some “faculty members might be involved in various other non-ethical activities such as
publishing papers in “sham” journals, falsifying data, bribing coauthors, paying ghostwriters,
or even stealing papers submitted to them for review and publishing them as their own”.
Academic fraud and dishonesty simply means a false statement, misrepresentation and a
deceitful conduct. The essence is to gain something of value (money or authority) by
misleading or deceiving the victims into believing that the intentions are genuine.
Types of Academic Fraud and Dishonesty
There are many types of academic fraud and dishonesty. Some are visible and others are
invisible, for the purpose of this chapter, academic fraud and dishonesty shall be deemed to
include, but not be limited to, the following types of misconduct. The list is not intended to be
exhaustive, but does identify major categories of fraud and dishonesty, and provides detailed
examples where appropriate. Plagiarism is the most common type of academic fraud and
dishonesty. However, we will try to give detail explanations of the following under listed.
1. Lobbying
2. Cheating
3. Revolving Doors
4. Bribery
5. Misrepresentation
6. Favoritism
7. Conspiracy
8. Fabrication
9. Collusion
10. Duplicate Submission
11. Conflict Of Interest
12. Improper Computer/Calculator Use
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13. Disruptive Behavior
14. Plagiarism
15. Copyright Violation
Lobbying
The word lobbying is as old as civilization itself. Everybody in our daily activity is prone to
use one lobbying techniques or the other. The original term “lobby came from an expression
of General Grant, president of the USA in the late nineteenth-century, after the fire that
destroyed the first White House, the President, who was staying in a hotel, complained about
the presence of all the people who were waiting on the ground floor (lobby) to try to
influence him” Farnel (2016). Lobbying was incubated into the American spirit since the
birth of the State. That was long time before the “1789 Constitution which stated that
lobbying is a right” Farnel (2016).
Lobbying means any activity that involves influencing decision or actions directly or
indirectly. Denisova-Schmidt (2017) defined “lobbying as any activity carried out to
influence a government or institution‟s policies and decisions in favor of a specific cause or
outcome”. Lobbying can be a force for good when it is being ethically practiced. In the same
vain lobbying can also create unexpected harm, hatred and disunity if the governing council
or authority takes action for one lobbyist group against the others. In some cases lobbying
came lead to crashing view, side taking and gossips. It creates room for bribery and
corruption, falsification and manipulation of results. The lobbyist may sometimes threaten
and force people to conform to their proposed strategies.
Cheating
Cheating can be described as any action designed to subvert rules in order to obtain unfair
advantages. It is an intentional act of breaking rules, laws and order to obtain an undue
advantage over others. Cheating in an academic environment includes copying from another
person's work; using unauthorized sources like textbooks, computer or internet and otherwise
failing to follow the instructions, rules and regulations or procedures in place during testing
or examination situation.
Examples of cheating in academic environment include:
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1) Copying from another student's test or examination answer booklet, homework or
assignment.
2) Giving student permission to copy from your answer booklet, homework or
assignment.
3) Using unauthorized materials such as textbooks, computers, or formula book during
testing or examination.
4) Doing assignment, test or writing exams for some else without the lectures
permission.
5) Writing names, matriculation numbers and signing attendance list for your friend who
was not in class without the lectures permission
6) Having someone else write test or exams for you and so on.
Olajuwon (2008) identified thus in relation to examinations, for example,
“insulting/assaulting examination officials, irregular activities inside and outside the
examination hall, smuggling in answers, contracting someone else to sit the exam (paying
someone to sit in), refusing to submit the answer script at the end of the examination,
impersonation, networking, dubbing (copying another‟s written exam paper), taking in
microchips (taking in notes/scribbles), leaking examinations, mass cheating, collusion, taking
in a hi-tech microcomputer, super print, bullets or missiles (taking in notes/scribbles), and
exposure (having access to the questions ahead of the examination)”.
Revolving Doors
This is a situation where an individuals who works in a public office or private company
moves back and forth between that public office or private company and another exploiting
his or her period of service for the benefit of the other organization for more financial
rewards. Most times, he/ she regulate the time; they share the working days in a week that is
two day in a public office and the other three days in a private office or the other sectors. A
good example is when an influential government official opts for employment as a university
lecturer.
Another way of explaining revolving doors is when administrators and governing council of a
university and other high institutions resolve to hiring the staff of other universities or
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institutions and then presents them as if they are their own staff during their institutional
accreditation and verification exercise and this continues whenever such exercise is schedule
to take place. In some cases, the perpetrator refers to it as collaboration or networking but it is
against academic integrity. It is misconduct, a violation of academic standard.
Bribery
Bribery is an act or attitude of offering someone something valuable or money in order
to persuade them to do a thing in your favour. Bribery according Legal Information Institute
(1992) bribery is the “offering, giving, receiving, or soliciting of any item of value to
influence the actions of an official or other person, in charge of a public or legal duty”.
Bribery is usually illegal and unethical; it is mostly in form of money, goods, properties,
privilege, emolument, or anything of value.
Wilkinson (2018) outlined that “bribery could be active or passive”, when a person offers,
promises or gives a bribe, it is called “active bribery” and when a person requests, receives,
or accepts a bribe, it is called „„passive bribery”. Both forms of bribery are of concern to
organizations and companies and are outlawed in most countries. Example of active bribery
is when a public official accept a bribe in order to award a contract in the briber‟s favour
while passive bribery is when a security officer in an organization accepts a bribe from
criminals to allow access for theft. Wilkinson (2018) noted that until the “advent of the UK
Bribery Act, the focus of anti-bribery legislation had been on active bribery of foreign public
officials as this is the main arena for bribery because of the harm it brings to societies and the
way it undermines fair trading”. Also the Organization for Economic Co-operation and
Development (OECD), Anti-bribery Convention and the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act
(FCPA) address only active bribery. In the academic environment, lecturers uses academic
advantage as a bribe, that is a situation where they offers a student a passing grade in
exchange for money, goods, sex, or other services.
Misrepresentation
This is the action of giving a false or misleading account of the nature of something. It is any
act intended to deceive an instructor for academic advantage. Misrepresentation includes
lying to an instructor in an attempt to increase ones grade or lying when accused with
allegations of fraud, misconduct or academic dishonesty. Kenton (2020) noted that
misrepresentation is a “false statement of a material fact made by one party which affects the
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other party's decision in agreeing to a contract. If the misrepresentation is discovered, the
contract can be declared void and depending on the situation, the adversely impacted party
may seek damages. In such a contract dispute, the party that made the misrepresentation
becomes the defendant, and the aggrieved party is the plaintiff‟‟.
Favouritism
This is a situation where someone is given unfair preferential treatment at the expense of
another. It is the tendency of offering undue affection, reward, gifts and opportunities to a
person or group based on personal beliefs. Favoritism occurs in every sector, even in
religious gatherings. As a matter of fact, God said to Rebecca “two nations are in your
womb, one I love and the other I hate.” Most time favoritism occurs as a result of
ethnicity and tribalism. A good example is when an employer gives preference toward
one‟s own tribe, religion or economic group in the context of hiring, friendship, or
romantic relationship. Hrab (2012) stated that “favoritism in the workplace is exactly what
it sounds like, favoring someone not because he or she is doing a great job, but for reasons
outside of the job performance”. For instance, a manager consistently offers an employee the
best and most highly-regarded projects, even though that employee does not perform well
enough to deserve them or perhaps an employee is offered a promotion over someone else
who has been at the company longer and has more experience (Hrab 2012).
In academic cycles, favoritism occurs when student of a particular state are given
preference over the other when seeking admission. It also occurs when the citizen of a
particular state where the institution is built are given scholarship over the others. In
some cases also, the governing council of educational institutions gives employment
opportunities and appointments to their relatives or to someone they know not on the
basis of merit but on the basis of familiarity and connections. Lecturers sometimes show
favoritism in scoring and supervising students who are familiar to them.
Conspiracy
This is a secret plot or plan by a group of persons to do something unlawful or harmful. It is
the activity of secretly planning with other people or party to do something unlawful or
illegal that will harm someone else or jeopardize the peace and harmony of a system. A good
example of this in academic environment is the activities of secret cult. We have heard cases
of vice chancellors, deans of colleges and lecturers been kidnapped by cult groups. Also,
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there are various cases of rapes, killings by black art, pyrates, and other confraternities in
institutions of higher learning around the world.
Fabrication
This is the act of manufacturing or make up stories that are not true. Fabrication most often
occurs in the field of sciences, where students and lecturers fabricate ideas or story to
conclude their laboratory experiment. Fabrication most times occurs in research when a
researcher list source in his research works that he did not actually cited or consulted in the
research. Also, Fabrication occurs in the student disciplinary panel, where a student has to
make up stories that are not true to defend his or her innocence.
Collusion
This is a secret or illegal cooperation or conspiracy in order to deceive others. Wikipedia
(2020) “Collusion is a secret cooperation or deceitful agreement in order to deceive others,
although not necessarily illegal, as is a conspiracy”. A secret agreement between two or more
parties to limit open competition by deceiving, misleading, or defrauding others of their legal
rights, or to obtain an objective forbidden by law typically by defrauding or gaining an unfair
market advantage is an example of collusion. Collusion is an agreement among firms or
individuals to divide a market, set prices, limit production or limit opportunities. It can
involve "unions, wage fixing, kickbacks, or misrepresenting the independence of the
relationship between the colluding parties" The parties involved in collusion are referred to
as cartels. Example of collusion in an academic environment is when a faculty member
ignore or pretend to ignore students‟ academic misbehaviors or lecturers who may have cited
each other‟s articles in a journal wrongly or out of necessity based on a pre-agreement since
they have the power to decide the winner.
Duplicate Submission
A duplicate submission is a form of academic misconduct; it is a situation where two students
duplicate each other‟s work and submits the same thing, word by word, letter by letter, same
names and the same matric numbers. It could also mean a situation where a researcher
submits the same article to be published in two different journals at the same time. For
example, a reviewer received a manuscript for consideration and somehow, the same
manuscript was sent to the same reviewer by another journal. At this point, he would
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write the editor-in-chief to decline the invitation to review due to duplicate
submission.
Conflict of Interest
This is a situation where someone uses his or her official capacity to make decisions that
would be to his/her personal benefits. Segal (2019) opined that “conflict of interest occurs
when an entity or individual becomes unreliable because of a clash between personal (or self-
serving) interests and professional duties or responsibilities”. Segal (2019) further stated that
such a conflict occurs when a company or person has a vested interest, such as money, status,
knowledge, relationships, or reputation, which puts into question whether their actions,
judgment, and/or decision-making can be unbiased. He was of the view that a conflict of
interest arises when a person chooses personal gain over the duties to an organization in
which they are a stakeholder or exploits their position for personal gain in some way.
Conflict of interest occurs when a top management level professional accepts a transaction
from another organization that benefits him or her and harms the organization or the
organization‟s clients. There are cases over the place where a top management officer in
academic setting awards contract of 2 million and use his / her official capacity to infuriate it
to 6 or 8 million and more. This is not only misconduct but a sin against God.
Improper Use of Computer and Cell Phones.
It is true that computer technologies and internet facilitates makes life interesting and
interacting, but more often than not, these gadgets are misused. However, such misuse could
lead to a lot of people spending too much time in front of the computer to the extent that it
becomes the center of their lives. When it becomes an addiction, it may result in Information
overload. It is also important to note that too much online surfing leads to decreased
productivity at work and reduction of interactions with family, friends and coworkers.
Sometimes, the desire to spend time on online activities such as sports, chatting with friends,
gambling and so on can leads to negligence of duties at work. In addition, Surfing of porn site
could leads to sexual addiction, sexual harassment and rape among the students and their
lecturers. Some of the students use these computer gadgets to distract lectures and other
academic programmes.
Disruptive Behavior
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Disruptive behavior is any form of behavior that disrupts teaching and learning process. That
is behaviours that interferes and interrupts normal processes and procedures.
Examples of disruptive behavior are talking, answering phone calls, seeing movie, chatting
and tweeting during lectures, posting irreverent or unrelated materials to on online discussion,
disrespecting, abusing or booing the lecturers.
Plagiarism
Roka (2017) Plagiarism (plagiary) derives from the Latin word „„Plagiarius‟‟ which means a
kidnapper and it was first described in literature by the dramatist Ben Jonson in 1601 to
describe someone guilty of literary theft.
According to the Merriam-Webster online dictionary to plagiarize means:
1. To steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own
2. To use (another's production) without crediting the source
3. To commit literary theft
4. To present as new and original an idea or product derived from an existing source.
Plagiarism means failure to properly cite any information sources consulted. In other words,
plagiarism means academic stealing. It is a fraud and it involves both stealing someone else's
idea and lying afterwards that it was yours. However, the original ideas are someone‟s
intellectual property which is usually protected by copyright laws.
Plagiarism occurs when you cope and present someone else's work as if it was your own.
Another person's work or idea may include written papers ( published or un published), oral
works, music, media, image art work, drama, re-creating a visual work or ideas, and
computer-based work with permission from the original owner.
Reason for Plagiarism
There are several reasons for plagiarism; for the purpose of this chapter we will try to identify
some of them
1. Inherent passion for success;
2. Desire for fame;
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3. Desperation for academic promotion;
4. Fear of failure and discrimination;
5. Ignorance;
6. For economic and financial reasons;
7. Time factor;
8. Lack of proper supervision;
Types of Plagiarism
It is very important to discuss different types of plagiarism and how they occur. All forms of
plagiarism are regarded as serious violations of academic honesty. The following are forms of
plagiarism:
1. Copy & paste
2. Global or complete
3. Paraphrasing
4. Mosaic plagiarism
5. Citing incorrectly
6. Self-plagiarism
7. Sharing work
8. Inaccurate Authorship or Ghost Writing
Copy & Paste:
This is also refers to as clone plagiarism and it is one of the most common types of
plagiarism. Almost all the students and researchers, one time or the other fall victim of this. It
occurs when a student or researcher copy information word-for-word from a source and paste
it into his/ her work without using quotation marks or citing the source properly
Global or Complete Plagiarism
This is one of the most serious types of plagiarism and it is very severe. It has to do with
deliberately and directly lying about the authorship of a work. It occurs when a student or
researcher present an entire manuscript or study that someone else conducted, and presents it
as his or her own work. It also occurs when a student or researcher hires someone else to
write assignment, term papers, articles or final year project for him or her.
Paraphrasing Plagiarism
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This has to do with rephrasing a piece of text in your own words without citing the original
source. It is paraphrasing without citation that is plagiarism. However, paraphrasing itself is
not a plagiarism as long as you properly cite the original sources. But it becomes a plagiarism
when you rewrite the key points as if they were your own ideas. Also when you translate a
work, you must cite the original source. Otherwise, a translation without a source is still a
plagiarism as long as the original source belong to some else.
Mosaic Plagiarism
It is also known as patchwork plagiarism, sometimes it is difficult to detect because it
combining text, ideas and phrases from different sources to give it a new look without
acknowledging the original author. Roka (2017) in The American Medical Association
Manual of Style describes mosaic plagiarism as “borrowing the ideas and opinions from an
original source and a few verbatim words or phrases without crediting the original author. In
this case, the plagiarist intertwines his or her own ideas and opinions with those of the
original author, creating a confused, plagiarized mass”.
Citing Incorrectly
This is a situation where a writer or researcher fails to give all the necessary information in
the sources cited. All citation rules of the citation style used must be carefully followed. In
other words, if the necessary information is wrongly placed, the writer may be committing
plagiarism.
Self-Plagiarism
This involves re-using sentences and ideas from your own previously published work with
citation or attribution. Roka (2017) added self-plagiarism also involves the “submission of
the same article to multiple journals to increase the chances of publication or making multiple
articles from a single article”.
Sharing Work
This type of plagiarism is common among the students. It occurs when they share their work
with other students who copies and also pass it off as their own or vice versa
Inaccurate Authorship or Ghost Writing
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This is a situation where the main contributor is not given due recognition and
acknowledgement while someone else who has not contributed is attributed.
Penalties for plagiarism
There are many consequences of plagiarism and all has severe penalties depend upon the
degree of gravity. However, with the use of plagiarism detection software, perpetrators are
being caught at an alarming rate. The followings are some of the punishment measures.
1. Blacklisting of the author and the publishers
2. Legal actions; fines and jail term
3. Expulsion from you academic institution
4. Repeating a course
5. Destruction professional and academic reputation.
Roka (2017) identified “retraction of the article, blacklisting of the author with or without
institution and expulsion from the institute, criminal charges and apology letter” as some of
the penalties for plagiarism.
How to Detection of Plagiarism
In the days of yore, the only way to detect plagiarism was through the authority and ability of
an experienced professor who most have read very wide and may have edited or reviewed
many articles. With the advent of internet and computer technologies, several plagiarism
detection softwares have been developed to trap plagiarism nightmare. Some of these
software‟s are free online and others are not. Examples are:
1. iThenticate - available at http://www.ithenticate.com
2. Turnitin - available at https://www.turnitin.com/
3. Viper - available at https://www.scanmyessay.com/
4. Dupli Checker - available at https://www.duplichecker.com/
5. Copy leaks - available at https://copyleaks.com/
6. Plagiarism Checker - available at http://plagiarisma.net/
7. PlagTracker - available at https://www.plagtracker.com/
8. Plagium - available at http://www.plagium.com/
9. PlagScan - available at https://www.plagscan.com/plagiarism-check/
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Common ways to avoid plagiarism
To avoid plagiarism, properly cite all the consulted sources through (APA, MLA or Chicago
style, etc). Also, Subject you work to plagiarism detecting software.
Roka (2017) in Das and Panjabi (2011) heighted the following points
1. Always acknowledge the original source of the idea, text, or illustration.
2. Enclose within quotation marks, all the text that has been copied verbatim from
another source.
3. When paraphrasing, use your own words.
4. When not sure if the idea/fact they wish to include is common knowledge, cite
references.
5. One must cite references accurately. The writer must read the instructions to authors
to know what style they need to use (Vancouver style or Harvard referencing).
6. Avoid writing multiple separate articles if he can present a large complex study in a
cohesive manner in a single article.
7. Along with the manuscript, submit a cover letter to the editor, clearly stating any
instances of overlapping from previous publications and asking for advice.
8. If unintentionally using somebody else‟s ideas or text without appropriate referencing,
to write to the editor of the journal for advice.
Copyright
Copyright is the exclusive and assignable legal right, given to the originator or the owner of
any form of works either literary, music or drama etc. Kenton (2020) defined copyright as
“the legal right of the owner of intellectual property. It is the right to copy. This means that
the original creators of products and anyone they give authorization to are the only ones with
the exclusive right to reproduce the work”
Copyright Law
Copy right law “gives creators of original material the exclusive right to further use and
duplicate that material for a given amount of time, at which point the copyrighted item
becomes public domain‟‟ (Kenton 2020). Every nation is expected to have a copyright
commission to enforce, enlighten, inform, regulate and sanction defaulters. It is vital for
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every nation to protect the intellectual property of her citizen from undue exploitation both
within and outside the country (Okwilagwe 2001).
Copyright Infringement
Okwilagwe (2001) copyright violation means “illegal reproduction of copyrighted material”.
He further explained that “reprography is the major way in which the various activities
amounting to violation of infringement of copyright such as plagiarism, counterfeiting and
piracy…” Kenton (2018) “Copyright infringement is the use or production of copyright-
protected material without the permission of the copyright holder”.
Types of Copyright Violation
It is true that many people that infringes on copyright are not aware that they are committing
crime due to ignorance. Often times, even those who are aware don‟t even care as long as
they are going to make money from committing such crime. However, the two commonest
way of copyright violation according Okwilagwe (2001) are “Photocopying” and “Piracy”
other forms are printing, scanning, electronic mailing, social network, electronic file sharing,
and so on.
Photocopying
This is the process of duplicating information materials and in the process of doing that,
peoples intellectual property are been violated. The exclusive right of any of those materials
belongs to the copyright holder. The fact that you bought any of those materials does not give
you the right to duplicate them. Although, fair use allow people to use copyrighted materials
without the author's permission. That is, if they are using the material for personal or
academic purposes.
Piracy
Popoola (1991) defines piracy as “the illegal reproduction and distribution, on a commercial
scale, of published work without the authorization of the copy right owners”. If you
reproduce any copy of someone else's content in any form (hard copy, digital, music, movies,
online etc.) and trade it for monetary gain in any way, you have fall victim of piracy and
counterfeiting because you did not obtained the original owner's rights to copy and trade
such content.
Printing
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This is the attitude of sending a file or document from the computer to a printer for print out.
More often than not, many content publishers have placed a limits on the number of pages a
particular document is expected be printed under a licensing cover. However, most materials
online/web are not expected to be downloaded let alone printed. As a web user you must
always check the limitations on the content you are about to print. Most times we, claim it
does not matter but it really matters because you are committing a crime by violating
someone's copyright.
Scanning
This means creating unauthorized digital copy as it is with photocopying and printing. Before
scanning any document you should always ask yourself if you have the right to duplicate
copies of someone else's document.
Electronic Mailing
The process of send messages, file and documents to someone else through electronic mailing
and also receiving same from others is known as electronic mailing. However, there are
various ways to infringe copyright through e-mail. Any e-mail you forwarded or received
from another person there is a copyright rule, so printing it without the author's permission
means violation of the author's exclusive rights. All email users may have infringed
someone's copyright through distribution of unauthorized contents. Even when you have
subscribed to online databases, you must pay attention to copyright notices and warnings that
are sent to your e-mails.
Social Networks
Users of social networks such as YouTube, Facebook, WhatsApp, Telegram, and Instagram
and so on are infringing copyright law by posting unauthorized contents on a public network
for others to access and repost. If the content is meant for only one person on a private
network, then why sharing it on a public network? This attitude is a violation of the exclusive
right to distribution held by the copyright owner.
Electronic File Sharing
File sharing, with our smart phones and pc‟s through sender, Bluetooth and other apps and
even through social network platforms. The downloading, Uploading and transferring of such
files whether in PDF form or word document from one device to another maybe an act of
infringement of copyright law.
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Examples of Copyright Infringement
1. When you copy, photoshop, resize, and repost another person‟s picture or image on
the internet.
2. When you pirate other people‟s music, movie or book for monetary purpose without
their permission.
3. When you download book, movies and music online without proper payment.
4. When you record or steal people‟s movies in a theater
5. When you use another person‟s picture for a blog without permission
6. When you make a video without licensing the music clips
7. Any form of coping people‟s original work without permission
Penalties for Copyright Infringement
Copyright Infringement may attract different types of punishment. But this may differ
depending on the type and the gravity of the violation. The penalty measures may differ from
one country to another based on the copy right commission. Some penalties measures
summarized by Purdue University community on copyright (2018) are listed below:
1. Infringer pays the actual dollar amount of damages and profits.
2. The law provides a range from $200 to $150,000 for each work infringed.
3. Infringer pays for all attorneys fees and court costs.
4. The Court can issue an injunction to stop the infringing acts.
5. The Court can impound the illegal works.
6. The infringer can go to jail.
Recommendations
1. The best way to prevent academic dishonesty is to teach and educate students to
embrace honesty and integrity in all their dealings.
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2. Provide policy hand-book for all students and condition of service hand-book for all
categories of staff.
3. Organize workshops, seminar and training sections for students on the implication of
fraud, dishonesty and misconduct.
4. Offender and perpetrators of evil must be brought be the disciplinary committee and if
found guilty, he or she must be punished according to the gravity of their offences as
stipulated in the hand book or condition of service without fear of favour.
5. Researchers must cite properly, quote where necessary to produce unique and original
work.
6. Supervisors must encourage students and researchers to use plagiarism detection
software to check the uniqueness of their work.
7. Institutions must adopt best practices and be advised on building academic integrity
policies to support the community.
8. Student /lecturer ratio should be used to assigned student to a supervisor to avoid over
work load on the supervisor.
9. Lecturers and Supervisors should create time to read through students work and guide
them accordingly. They should not only be a teacher but a mentor
10. Establish and affirm academic integrity as a core institutional value.
11. Obtain permission from the original owner before copy, photoshop, re-size, and repost
another person‟s picture or image and message, music or video on the internet or any
electronic platform.
12. Defaulters should be published in media to serve as a scape goat for the other to learn.
13. The body that regulate higher institutions of learning such
National Universities Commission (NUC) National Board for Technical Education,
otherwise known as (NBTE), National Commission for Colleges of
Education (NCCE) should display high level of integrity and transparency while
discharging their duties.
Conclusion
There is an urgent need for high level of understanding among stakeholders (students, staff -
academic and non-academic and researchers) to maintain high level of academic integrity.
The rate of fraud and dishonesty in the academic cycle is alarming. The only way to maintain
high quality of education and global standard in research is to uphold high standard of
academic integrity. Most students, faculty members and researchers engage the new
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technologies in committing academic frauds. In other words, various application software‟s
and digital cameras for monitoring and detecting academic frauds and dishonesty has been
developed all together. Academic environment is where intellectual minds are expected to be
trained. Therefore administrators of academic environment must adopt all necessary
measures to ensure that academic fraud and dishonesty are eliminated from the system .
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