25 Tools Blocked During Online Assessments by Xobin
From Slack to ChatGPT — the full list of apps Xobin shuts down the instant a proctored test begins, and why AI-assisted cheating attempts nearly doubled in a single year.
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Online exam cheating has become a genuine nightmare for hiring teams. Paper leaks used to be the worst of it — candidates now have well over 100 other methods at their disposal. Messaging apps, remote-access software, screen recorders, and AI assistants all compete to get a candidate through an assessment they didn’t actually earn.
Proctored-assessment fraud attempt rates more than doubled in 2025, climbing from 16% to 35%, according to research CodeSignal published in February 2026 based on millions of monitored assessments. Entry-level hiring saw the steepest jump, with cases rising from 15% to nearly 40% (PR Newswire, 2026).
At Xobin, we keep an active track on every tool and hack candidates try, updating our findings as fast as new ones show up. This piece walks through the 25 applications our platform actively blocks during a live assessment.
- Xobin blocks 25 named tools across five categories — communication, remote access, screen recording, browsers, and AI assistants — for the full duration of every proctored test.
- App-blocking is only half the system. Xobin pairs it with behavioral proctoring (facial detection, webcam monitoring, multi-display checks) and the AI Trust Score.
- A clean, high-scoring session doesn’t guarantee the candidate did the work themselves — recruiters need a trust signal, not just a pass/fail number.
- The list isn’t static. Xobin adds and retires tools as new cheating methods gain real adoption.
Which 25 Tools Get Shut Down the Moment an Assessment Starts?
This is the list Xobin’s customers ask about most — and it’s why “25 tools” isn’t a round marketing number. XoLock checks for and shuts down each one the moment a proctored assessment session begins.
| Category | Tools blocked |
|---|---|
| Communication & Conferencing | Slack, Discord, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Skype, Webex, Google Meet, WhatsApp, Telegram, Signal |
| Remote Access | TeamViewer, AnyDesk, Chrome Remote Desktop |
| Screen Recording | OBS Studio, ScreenFlow, QuickTime Player, Loom, ShareX |
| Browsers | Google Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Brave, Tor Browser |
| AI Assistants | Claude, ChatGPT |
Why isn’t a lockdown browser enough on its own?
A secure browser stops a candidate from opening a new tab. It does nothing about the second laptop sitting next to them, or the phone propped against a water bottle just out of camera view. That’s the gap most people miss when they hear “proctoring.”
Locking down the browser adds an important layer of security, but candidates use plenty of cheating methods that happen entirely outside the browser — invisible to it by design. That’s why “25 tools blocked” is one piece of a larger system: Xobin brings XoLock, screen monitoring, and behavioral analysis together to protect every assessment from multiple angles at once.
The Messaging Apps Candidates Rely On — Shut Down Before They Can Use Them
Communication apps are the most common cheating vector. They’re the easiest way to get a real human to feed answers in real time.
| App | How it’s handled |
|---|---|
| Slack | Detected as a background process and force-closed the moment the session starts. |
| Discord | Blocked before a candidate can open a voice or text channel. |
| MS Teams | Flagged and shut down instantly if launched during the assessment window. |
| Zoom | Blocked at launch and on every relaunch attempt, since XoLock rescans continuously. |
| Skype | Closed whether it’s being used for a call or screen sharing. |
| Webex | Detected even when minimized or running quietly in the background. |
| Google Meet | Blocked in both its browser tab and standalone app forms. |
| Detected in both the desktop app and the browser version. | |
| Telegram | Blocked, given how often it’s used to coordinate proxy test-taking. |
| Signal | Closed despite its privacy-first design — XoLock protects privacy by monitoring system activity, not personal content. |
The mechanism is straightforward: the moment a session starts, XoLock scans running and background processes for anything matching these apps and force-closes them before a candidate can share their screen or ask someone off-camera for help. Relaunch attempts get flagged instantly.
Why bother blocking ten different messaging apps instead of just the “main” ones? Because candidates rotate between them — which is exactly why a single-app block list would leave the door open.
What Happens When a Candidate Tries to Record or Remote In?
Remote Access Tools
Remote-access tools hand control of a candidate’s screen to someone else, or let that person watch it live from another location.
| Tool | How it’s handled |
|---|---|
| TeamViewer | Instantly detected and shut down as soon as a remote session starts. |
| AnyDesk | Flagged the same way, whether it’s initiating or receiving a connection. |
| Chrome Remote Desktop | Caught even though it runs inside a browser tab, since Xobin flags the remote-control behavior, not the file type. |
Chrome Remote Desktop sits in Remote Access, not Browsers, even though it runs inside a tab. Classification follows function, not format — if a tool lets someone else take control of your screen, it’s remote access, whether it’s a desktop app or a browser extension.
Xobin’s system checks for active remote sessions continuously, not just at login, so a candidate can’t start one mid-test and hope it slips through.
Screen Recording Software
| Tool | How it’s handled |
|---|---|
| OBS Studio | Recording process detected and shut down, even running silently in the background. |
| ScreenFlow | Flagged the moment it starts capturing, on macOS devices. |
| QuickTime Player | Blocked specifically in screen-recording mode, not just video playback. |
| Loom | Caught whether it’s the desktop app or the browser extension version. |
| ShareX | Detected as an active capture process, same as the others above. |
These tools typically capture the test for later, so candidates can share the recording with others who’ll take the same assessment. Xobin’s system checks for both live remote sessions and active recording processes — and it catches virtual machines too. Sometimes a candidate runs a parallel OS on the same device, hoping to hide a browser or app inside it. Xobin’s detection identifies that VM layer and shuts it down, not just the visible desktop.
Can Candidates Just Switch Browsers or Open ChatGPT? Not Anymore.
Browsers
| Browser | How it’s handled |
|---|---|
| Google Chrome | Blocked from launching or being switched to once XoLock’s secure browser is active. |
| Safari | Same rule applies on macOS devices. |
| Firefox | Detected and closed if a candidate tries to tab out to it. |
| Brave | Blocked despite its privacy features — XoLock checks for the process, not browsing history. |
| Tor Browser | Flagged and closed immediately, given its use for anonymized, untraceable searches. |
Regular browsers aren’t blocked because browsing itself is suspicious — they’re blocked because candidates must stay inside XoLock’s dedicated secure browser for the full test duration, with no tabbing out to search for answers or open a private AI chat window.
AI Assistants HIGH PRIORITY
| Assistant | How it’s handled |
|---|---|
| Claude | Detected and blocked as a background process the moment the assessment session begins. |
| ChatGPT | Blocked the same way, whether it’s the desktop app, browser tab, or a floating widget. |
This is the category that matters most right now, given how capable general-purpose AI assistants have become at completing hiring-test-style tasks in a fraction of the time an honest candidate would take.
Build one live follow-up question into every technical round, tied directly to the candidate’s own submitted work. Someone who didn’t actually write the code usually can’t explain their own reasoning under a quick follow-up, no matter how clean the original submission looked.
Does Xobin Catch Cheating Beyond Blocked Apps?
Blocking software handles part of the threat. The other part is behavioral — which is why Xobin also layers on facial detection and multi-display checks during every session, feeding into Xobin’s AI Trust Score. That combination is why app-blocking and behavioral proctoring have to run together rather than as substitutes for each other.
Entry-level and campus hiring tend to see some of the steepest fraud-attempt rates of any hiring segment, since high-volume hiring skews junior and technical — exactly where this risk concentrates.
Never advance a candidate on score alone. Pull the behavioral flag report every time, especially for junior and technical roles.
Why Recruiters Trust Xobin to Get This Right
Blocking 25 named tools closes the easiest paths to cheating — but that’s only half of what Xobin does for a recruiter.
Real-time app-blocking
XoLock scans running and background processes the moment a session starts, and continuously afterward — relaunching a blocked app mid-test triggers an instant flag.
Behavioral proctoring, layered on top
Facial detection, webcam monitoring, and multi-display checks watch what a candidate does, not just what they run.
A trust signal, not a pass/fail score
The AI Trust Score combines both signal types into one number, so recruiters can see how much weight a score can actually carry.
A list that keeps working
Xobin adds and retires tools as new cheating methods gain real adoption — this isn’t a one-time filter that goes stale.
Stop Guessing Who’s Cheating. Start Blocking It.
Reading the list is one thing. Watching XoLock shut down Zoom, ChatGPT, and a virtual machine in real time on a live candidate session is another.
Book a Personalized Demo →Frequently Asked Questions
Does Xobin block every app a candidate might use to cheat?
Xobin currently blocks 25 named applications across communication, remote access, screen recording, browser, and AI-assistant categories. Combined with behavioral proctoring like facial and multi-display detection, the system closes most gaps — though no proctoring system claims 100% coverage.
Can candidates still use ChatGPT or Claude during a Xobin assessment?
No. Xobin detects and blocks both ChatGPT and Claude as background processes once the assessment session begins. XoLock scans running applications continuously, not just at the start of the test, so relaunching either mid-session triggers a flag.
Why does Xobin block regular browsers like Chrome or Firefox?
Candidates take the assessment inside XoLock’s dedicated secure browser, not their regular one. Blocking standard browsers prevents tabbing out to search for answers or open an AI chat window outside the monitored environment.
How accurate is Xobin’s cheating detection?
Xobin’s proctoring team estimates the combined system — blocked applications plus facial detection, webcam monitoring, and multi-display checks — catches the large majority of cheating attempts. Failures tend to cluster around unusual network setups rather than the blocked-app list itself.
