IQVC | 收生小心推薦信，網上公然販賣名校教授推薦信，利用仿真官方電郵發出
- 服務及售價：
內地網購及社交平台上，有黑中介公開發售海外頂尖名校教授的推薦信，包括美國麻省理工學院（MIT）、英國倫敦大學學院（UCL）等，每封人民幣 4,000 元起，內容甚至可由申請人自行決定。
- 難辨真假（偽造仿真域名）：
有中介更聲稱，可聯絡「世界級」教授親筆撰寫，並承諾直接由「官方學校電郵」發出，但收費高達 8,000 美元（折合約 62,000 港元）。然而傳媒調查發現，中介根本無法使用真正的名校伺服器，而是利用技術註冊外觀極相似的「仿真域名」（例如將英國名校官方的 .ac.uk 偽造成極具誤導性的網頁域名），並看準部分地區對「.edu」等教育域名審批不嚴的漏洞，欺騙收生人員。
- 看準驗證過程弱點：
有中介向查詢者指出，所售的推薦信之所以極難被揭穿，皆因大學有驗證漏洞。假若一名學生同時申請 20 所大學，這 20 所學校都會向該名教授發信驗證。由於名校教授日常郵件量極大，很多時候根本無暇全數回覆，部分大學在久未得到回覆、或誤信仿真電郵的情況下，便會讓推薦信過關。
IQVC | Admissions Alert on Recommendation Letters. Forged Letters from Elite University Professors Sold Online via Lookalike Official Emails
- Services and Pricing:
On Mainland e-commerce and social media platforms, rogue agents are openly selling recommendation letters purportedly written by professors from top-tier global universities, including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and University of College London (UCL). Prices start at RMB 4,000 per letter, and applicants can even dictate the content themselves.
- Hard to Tell Apart from the Real Deal (Forged Lookalike Domains):
Some agents even claim they can arrange for “world-class” professors to personally pen the letters, promising they will be sent directly from “official university email addresses.” However, this comes at a premium of USD 8,000 (approximately HKD 62,000). Media investigations have revealed that these agents have absolutely no access to authentic university servers. Instead, they use technical exploits to register “lookalike domains” that closely mimic official URLs—such as spoofing a UK university’s official .ac.uk suffix into a highly misleading domain name. They also exploit loopholes in regions where regulations on securing educational domains like .edu are lax, successfully deceiving admissions personnel.
- Exploiting Weaknesses in the Verification Process:
An agent pointed out to an inquirer that the reason these sold recommendation letters are incredibly difficult to expose is due to a blind spot in the universities’ verification processes. If a student applies to 20 universities simultaneously, all 20 schools will send verification emails to the professor’s (spoofed) email address. Because elite university professors handle an overwhelming volume of daily correspondence, they often have no time to reply to every single query. When left without a response for too long, or after being misled by the lookalike email address, some universities simply wave the recommendation letter through.
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