GHCA-AD-01
AIS-4 — Assessment Integrity Standard
AIS-4 is the standard every proctored GHCA examination is delivered under. It sets what is checked before an examination is released, what happens during it, who may stop it, and what becomes of the session afterwards.
What applies today
AIS-4 is GHCA's adopted integrity standard and governs every proctored examination GHCA delivers. The clauses below are its real text.
Remote proctoring is not yet running. No proctoring vendor is contracted, and the platform does not currently record examination sessions, capture government photo ID, or perform biometric face matching. The clauses describing recording, live monitoring and biometric identity matching take effect for a candidate when proctored delivery is live for their sitting — they are not a description of something happening to candidates today.
What applies now: confirming your identity against your Registry record, the environment and conduct requirements, and the sealing of your session on submission. What GHCA actually holds about you, either way, is set out in the Privacy Notice.
What this standard covers
AIS-4 is the fourth and current revision of GHCA's Assessment Integrity Standard. It applies to every proctored examination delivered under a GHCA qualification, whether delivered by remote online proctoring or in person at an Authorized Training Provider.
It binds candidates, proctors, and any third-party proctoring vendor GHCA engages. Where the exam portal's behaviour and this standard differ, the standard governs and the portal is brought into line with it.
AIS-4.1 — Consent and disclosure
A candidate must affirmatively consent, before an examination begins, to the monitoring that applies to their sitting — including audio, video and screen recording where proctored delivery is in use for the duration of the session — and must confirm that their identity matches their GHCA Registry record.
The consent given is captured and retained as part of the session record.
AIS-4.2 — Identity verification
Every candidate's identity is verified immediately before an examination is released. Under full proctored delivery this is a two-factor check: a live face capture matched against the candidate's Registry photo, and a government-issued photo ID capture, with the match confidence score recorded on the session file.
A proctor holds final authority to approve, query or decline release of the examination on identity grounds, regardless of what an automated match score says. A machine does not get the last word on whether someone is who they say they are.
AIS-4.3 — Environment requirements
Candidates take the examination alone, in a quiet and adequately lit space, with the desk clear of unauthorized material, phones, second screens and earpieces.
Environment diagnostics — browser, connection, camera, microphone and screen-lockdown checks — must pass before an examination is released.
AIS-4.4 — Session monitoring
Sessions are monitored live, by recording, or both, for the full duration of the examination.
Loss of camera frame, leaving the browser tab or application, or a second voice detected in the audio channel is logged as an integrity event on the session record — whether or not it ever results in a malpractice finding. Logging an event is not an accusation.
AIS-4.5 — Proctor authority
A certified proctor may, in real time and on their professional judgment, issue a warning, flag a session for review afterwards, or terminate a session immediately where conduct presents a clear integrity breach.
A terminated session is sealed for review under the Malpractice and Maladministration Policy. Termination is not, by itself, a finding of malpractice.
AIS-4.6 — Permitted breaks
Where a qualification's assessment design allows a break — for example after a defined number of questions — the break is time-limited and does not stop the overall clock, unless a paused clock has been separately approved as a Reasonable Adjustment.
A break is itself monitored on the same terms as the rest of the session.
AIS-4.7 — Session sealing
On submission, on expiry of time, or on proctor termination, a candidate's responses and session record are cryptographically sealed and transmitted to the Global Registry.
A sealed session cannot be altered by any party — including GHCA staff — other than through a successful appeal under the Appeals Policy or a malpractice determination. This is the clause that makes a GHCA result worth relying on: not that GHCA promises not to change results, but that it has removed its own ability to change them quietly.
How this relates to other policies
An integrity event that escalates into a formal allegation is handled under the Malpractice and Maladministration Policy. Protection of the assessment content itself — as distinct from a candidate's conduct during a session — is governed separately by GHCA's Exam Security Policy.
A candidate who believes AIS-4 was misapplied to them may appeal. A future revision of this standard would be designated AIS-5 and would go through the same Board-level approval route.