South Korean prosecutors have filed the country’s first criminal case involving the use of AI-powered smart glasses to cheat in a national qualification examination. The Gwangju district prosecutor’s office last month indicted a man in his 40s on charges of violating the National Technical Qualification Act after he was allegedly caught using AI-enabled smart glasses during an examination in May. The man was detected after a supervisor for the fire protection facilities engineer certification exam noticed light reflecting from the lenses of his glasses during the examination in Gwangju. During questioning, he reportedly admitted to cheating and told investigators he had developed an AI application linked to the glasses “and wanted to see whether it could generate correct answers in a real exam”. Two men in their 20s were also booked in May after allegedly attempting to use AI-powered smart glasses during national technical qualification examinations in Seoul and Mokpo. Similar devices were also used in several Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC) examinations, with two candidates caught in May and another in June. Representatives from agencies administering major national qualification examinations reportedly met on 10 July to discuss countermeasures, including explicitly adding AI smart glasses to the list of prohibited items and significantly increasing penalties.