Universities across the UK are debating whether to continue using Turnitin, the assignment submission software, as criticism mounts over the company potentially using student work to train AI tools.
The software, which continues to be used by Cardiff University, is primarily used to deter plagiarism by checking the originality of texts submitted by students, it also offers the ability to check whether text is written by artificial intelligence.
The issue at hand revolves around a proposed change to Turnitin’s end user license agreement (EULA), which led to questions mounting over data privacy and intellectual property.
Several universities responded by starting to phase out the service, including the universities of Southampton, Westminster, and Newcastle. Aberdeen University has said it is “reviewing” its use of Turnitin, while the University of Cambridge has also pushed back on Turnitin’s proposed new policies.
In response to the widespread pushback, Turnitin said in a statement that it had “postponed the issue of a new EULA until September 2027”, and has “committed to redrafting the EULA” in partnership with universities to ensure any issues are addressed.
Turnitin, who are based in California, also confirmed that student data has not been used to develop generative AI models or large language models (LLMs), and that they have no intention to use student essays to do so in future.
While Cardiff University is yet to act, another Welsh institution shows a potential path for Cardiff if they were to transition away from the software. Aberystwyth University has allowed its students the option to submit assignments through Blackboard, the virtual learning environment, also known as Learning Central to Cardiff University students.
When it comes to detecting the use of generative AI in assignments, the owners of LLMs, such as Claude, are implementing invisible watermarking on generated text. It follows the introduction of the EU’s AI Act, which requires generative AI providers to mark generated content in a way that can be identified by users.
For some universities, the improvement of cheaper and, or alternative tools to detect generative AI usage, is what is actually driving institutions to reconsider whether Turnitin’s services are worth committing to.
The University of Westminster, who have chosen to end their contract with Turnitin in July 2027, described the company’s AI detector as “probabilistic rather than conclusive”, and said its core plagiarism checker was “largely ineffective” at dealing with generative AI content.