Contract Cheating – Dead or Reborn?

Online question-answering sites such as Chegg and Bartleby made contract cheating affordable to a wider audience by outsourcing answer services to developing countries such as India and often providing answers within 30 minutes. GPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer) language models can now give such answers in real-time and for free (or nearly free).This paper assesses the quality and promptness of answers provided by Chegg to a range of questions from CS1 and CS2 over a two-year period, comparing them to GPT-generated answers. Results demonstrate that GPT answers are of equal or better quality compared to those provided by human experts, and thus provide an equitable platform for students seeking answers. The paper considers some of the implications from a pedagogical standpoint.