ITS (Tuition.com.hk) Plagiarism Checker review (Score: 3 out of 6)

Verdict:  The scanner was used to test six sample documents and it detected plagiarism in three instances.

Service:   www.tuition.com.hk/plagiarism-checker.htm

What are the subscription options? e.g. free, paid only, paid and free. If paid options, what length of subscription/price structure is offered?Free online checker.
Maximum word count? (if any)Online checker will only search the first 32 words of each submission.
Resubmissions allowed? If so, is this limited?Unlimited checks.
Type of scanner E.g. software download, copy and paste, upload document online.  Say if multiple options are offered.“Copy and Paste’ online scanner.
Sources checked E.g. internet, any specific journal databases mentioned, any electronic book databases such as Google docs mentioned, past submissions from other students etcWebsite – no words altered; Website – some words removed; Website – some words changed; Website – fully paraphrased; Online pdf; Electronic book.
File types supported E.g. doc, docx, rtf, open office, pdfs, pptsNone – the user can only cut and paste text into the online scanner.
Extra features? E.g. grammar checker, spelling checkerNone.
Support offered? E.g. phone, email etcThere is no support offered for the online plagiarism checker although there is a “About Us” link which provides a contact telephone number for Hong Kong.
Report  / results
Type of report Downloadable? Shareable?Reports are generated within the website’s browser but these can’t be downloaded or shared.
Side by side comparison to plagiarism?No.
Accuracy of results – Which sections were detected and which were not (make sure the correct source is identified)
Basic plagiarism – copied and pasted from a website sourceDetected. The online scanner correctly identified the webpage which contained material that had been plagiarised.
Basic plagiarism – copied and pasted from an online pdfNot detected. The online scanner did not identify the online pdf which contained material that had been plagiarised.
Some words removed – copied and pasted from a website sourceDetected. The online scanner correctly identified the webpage which contained material that had been plagiarised.
Some words changed – copied and pasted from a website sourceDetected. The online scanner correctly identified the webpage which contained material that had been plagiarised.
Full paraphrasing – copied and pasted from a website sourceNot detected. The online scanner did not identify the website which contained material that had been plagiarised.
Basic plagiarism – copied and pasted from an electronic bookNot detected. The online scanner did not identify the electronic book which contained material that had been plagiarised.
General observations Ease of use, overall experience.  If other features were included (e.g. spelling, grammar check), how easy were they to use and how useful were they?
Tuition.com/hk is a website tailored towards providing language tuition for foreign school children who have recently moved to Hong Kong. In addition to this, it also provides a range of free resources, including an online plagiarism checker. The design of the website is professional and it’s easy to navigate around it. No online support is offered specifically for the plagiarism checker and the only way to get in touch is to make a long distance call to Hong Kong. The scanner developed by the website has a basic design with limited functionality. It works by taking the first 32 words of each submission and running them through a search engine (or search engines – it is not specified which ones are used). If the document has been plagiarised, and if the site the words have been plagiarised from has been indexed by the search engine it uses, the scanner will produce a page of search results listing which sites the text has been plagiarised from. Because of the limited number of words which can be scanned in one go, the website does not offer a “file upload’ facility. The scanner was used to test six sample documents and it detected plagiarism in three instances. It was able to detect work which had been copied and pasted from the internet, from an internet source where some of the words had been removed and from an internet source where some of the words had been changed. It did not detect the plagiarism of an online pdf, nor did it detect plagiarism in a paraphrased document or from an ebook. Despite its limited functionality, it scored better than some other online free plagiarism checkers, but even then the scanner was only able to detect plagiarism half the time – not great odds. If you want to check for plagiarism using this scanner, it would be advisable to use some other free online scanners too.

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