ProctorU fakes their stats for "catching cheats" by creating last minute rules thereby refusing students to take their exams. They disallowed my calculator though my Professor okayed it in writing for many years prior. I begged for over an hour and finally they "let" me use the Windows calculator, though they were extremely upset because that meant they couldn't "lock down" my machine with their browser, which is a Trojan Virus (according to Norton Antivirus). Beware of these people PLEASE. They will do anything to look like they are catching cheaters, even refuse to allow a perfectly normal calculator that had been pre-approved in writing.
This is my third time they have refused to allow me to take a final exam due to some arbitrary and meaningless rule they invented minutes before my exam was about to begin. Due to the press coverage about their "catching cheaters" I have become convinced through my stories and those of other people I've spoken to, and read on the Internet, that ProctorU creates emergencies in order to "catch cheats" who really are not cheats at all. Then they flout these statistics to prove how effective they are, and sell their services to additional universities. In essence they are creating much ado about nothing, while invading the students' privacy, upsetting us by not allowing us to take exams at all, and enforcing arbitrary rules and regulations out of nowhere.
They have nearly ruined my academic record. Fortunately my Professor was also upset with them because he said he had written well in advance allowing my type of calculator (and my calculator specifically) and that they had no right to disalow it or to tell me I couldn't take my final exam. He offered to allow me to take it again with his encouragement and/or negotiate a grade without the exam. He said ProctorU and Oregon State University owed me an apology.
I think it is more that ProctorU owes all the distance learners an apology for using them to further their sales pitch by creating monstrous emergencies in order to say how "effective" they are. This needs to be stopped, NOW before more students' lives are ruined by this arbitrary, invasive, unsympathetic business grows any further and networks into these student's lives. I will forever take my exams at the local library and I encourage all students to find alternative proctoring services. ProctorU is a complete sham.
I paid $23 to have my academic record ruined by ProctorU because they decided my calculator was not allowed, with no warning, and meanwhile it was not only allowed but it was recommended by my professor. It's not the money, it's the principle. I want them to stop scaring students while making themselves look like heroes.