Multiple University of Edinburgh students have told The Student they are considering boycotting Turnitin over fears their coursework will be used to train AI models, after the University declined to say whether they had raised concerns with the company directly.
The plagiarism-detection software, widely used across UK higher education, sparked anger over the summer by tweaking its End User Licence Agreement (EULA), opening the door for AI services to draw on student submissions.
Facing backlash, the California-based tech firm u-turned on the decision, but confirmed its intention to revisit the data-sharing changes next year.
When asked by The Student whether the University had raised objections with Turnitin, a spokesperson declined to answer, saying only that the University would “continue to work with Turnitin” to ensure it meets required data protection standards.
“We take the security and privacy of all our students’ data very seriously,” the spokesperson said, in a response to The Student.
When given the opportunity to expand further on student concerns, they declined.
By contrast, The University of Southampton announced in a recent statement that it will not renew its contract with Turnitin and has begun phasing out the software, making it the first University to sever ties over controversy.
Southampton cited “a responsibility to protect the data, intellectual property and academic work” of students and staff for their motive.
A fourth-year politics and sociology student said they were “strongly considering boycotting turnitin and trying to find a different way of handing in work” as a result of the ambiguity stoked by the company’s position.
“I’m really upset and frustrated about Turnitin changing their policy on AI,” she said, adding that unless the University used a different system, she would have no choice but to “opt out.”
Other students raised the paradox of using anti-plagiarism tools that may themselves repurpose student writing.
“There must be a risk of plagiarism — if an AI can read my essay it could spit out a part of it, or one of my ideas, in someone else’s essay,” said a third-year History and Italian student.
“Each essay represents an investment of time and effort, shouldn’t we have some control over how our work is used?” he added.
A second-year History student said he felt “frustrated” by the University’s response: “I refuse to let my coursework be gobbled up by Silicon Valley tech giants for a cause that is so clearly dangerous.”
Similar arguments have been made by student leaders nationally in recent days, with Justine Pedussel, the National Union of Students (NUS) Scotland president, telling The National, “This is not what we signed up to, nor do we consent to this.”
“We need universities and colleges to protect our rights over our work here, and call on leadership and academics to stand with students on this,” she added.
Turnitin was approached for comment by The Student.
In a separate statement quoted by the BBC, a spokesperson for Turnitin said: “As Turnitin has expanded the in-product use of AI, and as we assist customers in navigating their own AI use, our institutional agreements were updated to reflect current data practices.”
To give us time to discuss any changes with customers, we are not updating it any earlier than September 1, 2027.
We do not use customer or student work to train the AI assistant within Turnitin Clarity. We may use anonymized student submissions to improve our detection and assessment tools.”
Photo by V2F on Unsplash.
