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Navigating Technology [TEST] : AI: Academic Integrity & Copyright
Academic Integrity & Copyright when using GenAI: sub-module
Using generative AI responsibly involves understanding academic integrity and copyright guidelines, especially when creating or sharing content. It’s important to disclose AI use in your work, cite any AI-generated material as required, and respect copyright by ensuring you’re not directly reproducing others’ work without permission. This awareness helps maintain ethical standards in both academic and personal projects, promoting responsible and respectful use of AI tools.
Academic Integrity
As you navigate the world of generative AI, it's crucial to uphold academic integrity in all your work. Start by asking your instructor about your college's policies regarding the use of AI tools in assignments, as each institution may have specific guidelines. Familiarize yourself with your college’s academic integrity and generative AI policies to ensure you’re compliant with their standards. Don’t hesitate to experiment with AI tools to see how they can enhance your learning, but always remember to critically evaluate the information they provide. It’s important to discern credible content from potential inaccuracies or biases. Finally, make sure to cite any AI-generated outputs appropriately in your work, just as you would with traditional sources, to maintain transparency and respect for intellectual property.
Things to Consider
Generative AI tools rely on information from the internet, which includes both accurate and reliable sources as well as outdated, biased, or incorrect information. These tools can sometimes provide inaccurate explanations or misrepresent sources, so it’s essential to critically evaluate their outputs—just as you would with any information source. Learn more about evaluating generative AI outputs on the AI Literacy & Evaluation Criteria page- opens in a new window.
Students should be aware that using generative AI tools typically requires creating an account. When you create accounts or interact with AI platforms, your personal information, inputs, and even behavioural data can be collected, which may be stored or shared with third parties.
Additionally, there’s a risk that sensitive information shared with AI could be used to further train the model, potentially leading to unintended data exposure. It’s important for students to be mindful of the information shared during account creation and to review the privacy policies and terms of use for any generative AI tool to understand how your data will be handled and to be cautious about sharing any personal or sensitive information.
When using generative AI tools, it’s essential to consider the purpose and intent behind your use to maintain academic integrity and ethical standards. Ask yourself: What am I using this software to create? For instance, if you’re using an image generator, are you trying to replicate the style of a specific living artist? This raises ethical concerns, as it may infringe upon that artist’s intellectual property. Similarly, consider whether you’re using AI to complete assignments or produce content without informing your instructor. Using generative AI tools in a class setting without your teacher’s knowledge can lead to misunderstandings and potential breaches of academic integrity policies. Always be transparent with your instructor about how you’re incorporating AI into your work, and ensure that your use aligns with your institution’s policies.
Generative AI can enhance various tasks, but it cannot replace essential skills like research, critical thinking, and evaluating information. While AI tools can quickly provide information, the ability to conduct thorough research—formulating effective questions, identifying credible sources, and synthesizing information—is vital. Critical thinking enables you to analyze AI-generated content for validity and discern bias or inaccuracies. Instead of replacing these skills, generative AI should be viewed as a supportive tool that enhances your research capabilities, allowing you to focus on deeper analysis and critical engagement with the material for more informed outcomes.
When you use generative AI tools to create content it’s essential to disclose that it’s AI-generated. In academic work, be sure to check your college's policies and let your instructor know how you’re using AI, as transparency is part of academic integrity.
Disclosure Statements
When using generative AI tools, it's important to include clear disclosure statements to inform your audience about the AI’s role in content creation. Unlike citations, which specifically credit the source of information, disclosure statements provide transparency about how AI has been used—whether it's for generating ideas, drafting content, or providing assistance. This distinction helps maintain ethical standards and fosters trust, ensuring that your audience understands when and how AI has contributed to the material.
There are many different ways to present disclosure statements, depending on how AI was used and the requirements of your institution. Whether brief or detailed, the important thing is that they clearly explain how AI contributed to your work, ensuring transparency and academic integrity. When in doubt, always consult your instructor about their expectations.
Recommended Format
tool, purpose, prompt
Example:
- Microsoft's Copilot was used to generate ideas for this assignment using the following prompt: "[prompt]".
Copyright
Generative AI tools often use material sourced from the internet, typically without explicit permission from original authors. Some argue that this practice can resemble "copyright laundering- opens in a new window" by creating derivative works based on existing material without directly infringing on copyright laws.
Things to Consider
The nature of generative AI (GenAI) content, and the increasing popularity of GenAI tools have led to important copyright questions including defining copyright ownership of generative AI works and the rights of creators whose works have been used to train AI models. The following provides an overview of copyright considerations to keep in mind when using GenAI tools. Due to the rapidly changing GenAI copyright landscape, the information presented below will change over time.
GenAI Input & Output
The two main areas of copyright concern revolve around generative AI input and output.
- Input: Generative AI relies on large amounts of data to build its models and generate outputs. Some GenAI tools may have trained their systems by copying content without permission from the creators or copyright holders. This has raised copyright infringement concerns and has been the focus of several lawsuits.
- Output: In Canada, copyright ownership of generative AI content is still uncertain which means that a creator may not be able to claim copyright protection for works they create using GenAI tools. At the same time, it’s challenging to provide attribution to the original authors whose works were used to train GenAI models.
Copyright Best Practices When Using GenAI Tools
- Understand Your Rights and Responsibilities GenAI tools have terms of use that outline ownership and appropriate use of the tool. It’s important to review and understand the terms so that you are aware of your responsibilities and rights as a user. For example, some tools may claim ownership of the output, or make users responsible for copyright infringement that may result from using the tool.
- Respect Copyright and Licensing Terms Always ensure that you have permission from the copyright holder or have verified that you can use a piece of text, image, or other content as input in GenAI tools. It’s also helpful to learn more about the data used to train the GenAI tool to identify potential copyright infringement issues.
- Consider Using Public Domain and Openly Licensed Content Try to use prompts / inputs that are in the public domain or released under an open licence since these materials can be used more freely. For materials with an open licence, such as Creative Commons, make sure to review the licence terms to understand permitted use of the material. For more information on using Creative Commons content in GenAI tools, see Understanding CC Licenses and Generative AI- opens in a new window. Similarly, consider using GenAI tools that only include training data that are from the public domain and/or the tool's developers have licensed.
- Use Original Prompts and Inputs Consider using original prompts and inputs instead of copying or adapting another creator’s work. Before using your original work, it’s important to review the tool’s terms of use to understand how inputs are handled within the tool.
Check your college's copyright guides- opens in a new window for more information about Generative AI & copyright.
Additional Resources
Attributions
Information on this page was adapted, with permission from "What Students Should Know About AI & ChatGPT- opens in a new tab" by Centennial College Libraries. Along with information from "AI & Academic Integrity - opens in a new tab" and "AI & Copyright - opens in a new tab" by Seneca Polytechnic Libraries.
