> I'd be willing to bet this scam was covid related You might be correct. The obvious idea is that it's more difficult to identify the phantom students if ever

> I'd be willing to bet this scam was covid related You might be correct. The obvious idea is that it's more difficult to identify the phantom students if everything is virtual. That being said, where I teach, we have a system (both for on-ground and on-line) where you have to complete at least one non-trivial assignment (usually a quiz) within the first 2 weeks of the semester. If you don't complete the quiz (or whatever), you are dropped from the course and the loans are not fully released. I imagine our policy was in response to "phantom" students abusing the loan system. But our policy has been in place for at least 10 years so the scam has been afoot for a while.