The court heard that Huang used a fraudulent TOEFL result in an effort to meet the English proficiency requirement at Lingnan University, HKFP reported.

Huang enrolled in a public management-related undergraduate program at Lingnan in September 2022. To graduate, students were required to submit either a TOEFL score of at least 87 out of 120 or an IELTS score of 6.5.

After four failed attempts at English proficiency tests, Huang emailed a TOEFL score report to the university in May 2024. University staff later noticed that the photo on the certificate did not match her appearance and asked her to explain. Huang initially claimed she had taken the exam herself in Cambodia, but after the university verified the record with the testing authority, she admitted she had hired a proxy test-taker.

Huang was arrested on Feb. 8, 2025, according to Sing Tao Headlines.

She told investigators that she believed taking the test overseas would be easier and traveled to Cambodia to register. Feeling unwell on the exam day, she paid US$300 for another person to sit the TOEFL exam on her behalf. When she later received the score report and saw that the photograph was not hers, she edited the image before submitting it to the university.

Her lawyer told the court that Lingnan University had already disciplined Huang by ordering her to complete 108 hours of community service. The court also heard that, on a later attempt, Huang took an English test herself and achieved a passing score.

Despite this, the magistrate said using falsified academic credentials to graduate or seek employment amounted to what the court described as "qualification laundering," a serious offense comparable in gravity to money laundering. The three-month jail sentence was imposed as a deterrent, the judge said.

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