French education minister announces new degree qualifications database

Najat Vallaud-Belkacem launches first-of-its-kind digital certification service as part of Education Ministry’s modernisation plan

Published on
January 22, 2016
Last updated
February 16, 2017
John Elmes
The move by the French government to digitise qualifications data could end the need to show degree certificates

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Reader's comments (1)

#1 Submitted by Jayne Rowley on January 26, 2016 - 2:51pm
It's good to see the French government is the latest nation to take degree fraud seriously, but as we’ve learned from running the Higher Education Degree Datacheck in the UK, the key to protecting higher education goes beyond one initiative, it requires collaboration from universities, employers and government. Hedd.ac.uk is a very similar system to that proposed in France. Backed by the government, so far it contains candidate information from 26 UK universities, enabling higher qualification qualifications for a quarter of UK graduates to be verified through a secure online service. Since launching it has processed more than 90,000 qualification checks and identified over 200 bogus institutions. Working with authorities here and overseas, over 40% of illicit operators reported to us since June have been closed down. France is joining a long line of countries that have had to tackle fraud as the number of fake institutions selling degrees far outweighs genuine institutions internationally, and more appear online daily. What appears to be a genuine UK university online can be run from anywhere in the world. This isn’t a problem that will just go away. It won’t cease to exist without collaboration. Employers must verify qualifications as a matter of course. Authorities must work collaboratively internationally. Government must continue to invest and back the systems in place. And universities must take action individually and collectively with clear policies on degree fraud to protect their brand, reputation and students.

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