Bots in the Classroom: How AI and Cybersecurity Can Protect Community Colleges from Fake Enrollments

Across the country, community colleges are grappling with a growing digital threat: automated and fraudulent student enrollments. These so-called “ghost students” are not just a data anomaly—they’re actively undermining course delivery, exhausting faculty bandwidth, and limiting access for real students. In an era of increasingly sophisticated automation and artificial intelligence, community colleges must adopt modern cybersecurity tools to safeguard academic integrity and operational efficiency.

When Enrollments Become Exploits

Many community colleges are designed to be inclusive, offering open enrollment and minimal application barriers. While this mission is vital to expanding educational access, it also opens the door to exploitation. Fake applications—sometimes submitted by bots and other times by coordinated fraud actors—are flooding class rosters. These accounts rarely participate in coursework, yet they consume institutional resources, occupy seats meant for genuine students, and distort data used for planning and funding.

In some of my own classes, I’ve witnessed firsthand the disruption this creates:

• Dozens of emails from accounts that never engage

• Course discussions rendered ineffective by inactive participants

• Group projects that collapse due to non-responsive team members

• Entire rosters populated by as much as 85% fraudulent accounts

These scenarios are not theoretical—they’re happening in real time. The result is an erosion of classroom trust, an increase in faculty workload, and a diminished learning experience for the students who are actually here to learn.

Why Community Colleges Are Prime Targets

Several factors make community colleges particularly vulnerable. The simplicity of the application process, combined with generous financial aid opportunities and limited identity verification, creates a perfect storm for fraud. When courses are conducted online, verifying a student’s identity becomes even more difficult. And because faculty are often the first to notice these patterns, they end up bearing the operational burden—vetting questionable students, monitoring non-engagement, and managing inflated class sizes.

As AI tools become more accessible, it’s easier than ever to automate thousands of fraudulent applications at once. These bots can fabricate convincing identities, use anonymized IPs, and pass undetected through traditional systems. Without strong safeguards, colleges risk becoming unintentional entry points for widespread financial and administrative abuse.

A Path Forward: Cyber Assessment as a Starting Point

Community colleges must transition from reactive to proactive cybersecurity strategies. The first step is a comprehensive cyber assessment—a systematic review of application workflows, digital infrastructure, and data security policies. This diagnostic process can identify critical gaps, such as:

• Weak or missing identity verification mechanisms

• Unsecured enrollment platforms

• Poor visibility into user activity across systems

Once these vulnerabilities are mapped, institutions are in a stronger position to deploy targeted defenses and update outdated workflows.

AI as a Defensive Asset

AI is not only a tool for attackers—it can also be a frontline defense. Institutions can integrate machine learning models into their enrollment systems to flag anomalies in real time. These models can:

• Detect duplicate or bot-generated applications

• Analyze behavioral patterns such as login frequency, IP addresses, or device signatures

• Score incoming applications based on fraud risk

• Cross-reference patterns across networks of colleges to identify coordinated fraud attempts

Crucially, these systems can be calibrated to each institution’s needs and risk thresholds. The goal is not to create barriers for real students but to ensure that bad actors are identified before they enter the system.

Protecting Faculty Time and Student Experience

Faculty should be educators, not fraud investigators. Yet in the current landscape, instructors are often left triaging bot accounts and chasing inactive students instead of focusing on teaching. This misallocation of time has real consequences: students lose access to mentorship, office hours, and meaningful feedback when instructors are overwhelmed.

By investing in enrollment security and integrating AI-powered monitoring tools, institutions can restore balance—allowing faculty to spend their time where it matters most: with real students, in real classrooms, delivering real instruction.

Institutional Action: What Leaders Can Do

To address this growing issue, administrators, IT leaders, and policymakers should act decisively:

• Conduct a cyber assessment to evaluate vulnerabilities in enrollment and student identity workflows

• Implement AI-driven fraud detection at the application level to prevent ghost students from entering the LMS or registration systems

• Strengthen identity verification for financial aid recipients and online course participants

• Create clear faculty protocols for removing inactive students in the first weeks of class

• Invest in shared intelligence networks between institutions to track and mitigate evolving fraud patterns

This is not just a technology issue—it’s a matter of educational access, workforce equity, and the sustainability of our public education system.

Conclusion: A Call to Safeguard the Mission

Community colleges play a critical role in expanding opportunity and mobility. But to fulfill this mission, institutions must ensure that classrooms are filled with real students—not bots. Cybersecurity, when combined with thoughtful policy and proactive leadership, can be a powerful ally in this fight. Let’s strengthen our systems, protect our educators, and give every legitimate learner the chance to thrive.

⸻

About the Author

Mohamed Sharif-Idiris is the CEO of Digital Nomadic Solutions (DNS) and a Professor of Computer Science and Cybersecurity at Southwestern Community College. With a robust background in software engineering, digital forensics, and security automation, he brings deep industry and academic expertise to the challenges facing higher education. Prior to founding DNS, Mohamed held key roles at General Motors, where he led initiatives in cyber threat detection and AI-driven security systems. Today, he combines his leadership in innovation with a mission to help institutions build scalable, secure technology solutions for the future.