Exam Security and Safe Exam Browser
What an online exam can and cannot stop, exemptions, and locking lab computers with Safe Exam Browser.
What the exam page does on its own
During every online exam, copying, pasting from outside the exam, right-click, printing and saving the page are turned off. A pupil can still copy and paste within their own answer, and pupils who use a screen reader or the keyboard sit exactly as before. If a pupil switches to another tab or app, or leaves full screen, it is recorded and counted, and the pupil sees a plain on-screen count. You see it on the monitor and in that pupil's timeline.
⚠️ What it cannot stop
A web page cannot stop a pupil opening another tab or app, or minimising the window — it can only notice and count it. Nothing on the computer stops a second device, a phone, or another person. These safeguards discourage casual cheating; they are not a lock. Keep invigilating.
Full screen and exit limits
The "Screen rules" card, under the exam's "Exam-day security", can submit a pupil's exam, with the answers they have, after they leave the exam screen a number of times you choose. The pupil is warned before the last one, and the monitor alerts you when a pupil has one exit left. Tick "Require full screen" to hide the paper until the pupil is back in full screen; the clock keeps running. Both are off unless you switch them on. You can relax them at any time, but you cannot tighten them once anyone has started.
Exempting a named pupil
Some pupils cannot sit under these rules — one whose assistive technology does not work in full screen, for example. On the monitor, tick what they are freed from, type a reason and press "Exempt". "Screen rules": the exit limit never submits them and full screen never blocks them, though their exits are still counted. "Safe Exam Browser": they may sit in an ordinary browser — the screen rules still apply unless "Screen rules" is ticked too. "Webcam photos": they are left out of photos. "Remove exemption" takes an exemption away, again with a reason. The reason is never shown to the pupil.
Safe Exam Browser: a lock for lab computers
Safe Exam Browser is a free exam browser that locks a computer to your exam until it is submitted: no other tab, no other app, no minimising. It is not required: it is optional, chosen exam by exam, and without it an exam runs in an ordinary browser under the screen rules above. Once you require it, the exam will not open in any other browser. It has been tested with Safe Exam Browser 3.10.2 on Windows, which is what most school labs run. Versions for Mac and iPad exist, and the exam file is built for them too — it asks them for their modern web view — but they have not been tested with Tocademy yet. If Safe Exam Browser on a Mac opens a blank page, or says its classic web view is deprecated, it has started on its own settings and the exam file is not in force: open the downloaded file directly in Safe Exam Browser, and run a practice paper through the check below on every such computer before you rely on it.
Before you start
You need the exam already created, Windows computers you are allowed to install software on, and about twenty minutes the first time you do this. Decide the quit password before you begin. If you also want webcam photos, have a school-wide administrator switch them on first: the exam file carries the camera permission with it, so turning photos on afterwards means generating the file and copying it to every computer all over again.
Step 1 — Generate the exam file
Open the exam, open "Exam-day security" and find the "Safe Exam Browser" card. Tick "Generate the exam file". Type a "Quit password" of at least 12 characters. Leave the "Browser Exam Keys" box empty for now — those keys are read out of the file, so they cannot be pasted before the file exists, and a save that tries to do both is refused. Do not switch the requirement on yet; it cannot be switched on until the file exists. Press "Save Safe Exam Browser settings".
Step 2 — Download it
Saving adds a new block directly under the "Save Safe Exam Browser settings" button, holding a "Download the exam file" link, a "Test a lab computer" link, and the exam's "Config Key". Use the download link and keep the file somewhere you can copy it from — a memory stick is usually easiest. If that block does not appear, the save did not go through: look for a message in red just above the form.
Step 3 — Install Safe Exam Browser on each computer
On every computer a pupil will sit at, install Safe Exam Browser for Windows — it is free from safeexambrowser.org — and copy the exam file onto that computer. Version 3.4 or later is needed, and 3.10.2 is the version this platform is tested against. Versions for Mac and iPad exist but have not been tested here.
Step 4 — Test every computer before exam day
On each computer, open the exam file. Safe Exam Browser starts and asks you to sign in; sign in with your own staff account and the "Safe Exam Browser check" page tells you how that computer did. "This computer passes." means it is ready. Do this on every computer, not a sample: one wrong web address refuses the whole room on the day, and the morning of the exam is a bad time to find out.
Step 5 — Require it, once every computer passes
Go back to the exam's "Safe Exam Browser" card, tick "Require Safe Exam Browser", and press "Save Safe Exam Browser settings" again. The exam will then open in nothing else. This can only be done before the first pupil starts, which is why the testing comes first.
Step 6 — On the day
The quickest way in: each pupil signs in to their portal in an ordinary browser, opens Exams and presses "Open in Safe Exam Browser" on the exam. Safe Exam Browser starts, locks the computer and opens the exam already signed in, so nobody types an admission number and password on the lab computer. The link works once and for five minutes; if it has expired, press the button again. The button has been tried on Windows only; it is wired for a Mac and an iPad too, but until a sitting there has been recorded, have those pupils open the exam file instead. A pupil can always open the exam file, as you tested, and sign in on the page Safe Exam Browser shows. An exam file generated before this button existed opens the sign-in page either way; generate the file again before anyone starts to switch it on. When a pupil submits, Safe Exam Browser closes on its own — nobody needs the quit password for a normal finish.
What the quit password is for
An invigilator types it to close Safe Exam Browser before a pupil has submitted — a computer that misbehaves, a pupil who falls ill, an exam called off part-way. Short of switching the computer off at the wall, nothing else gets out. So keep it from pupils: anyone who knows it can leave the exam and reach the desktop. It must be at least 12 characters because it travels inside the exam file every pupil receives. The platform never shows it again, so write it down where invigilators can reach it on the day; if it is lost, generate the file again with a new password and copy the new file to every computer.
If a computer does not pass
The check page names the one thing that failed and what to do about it. "This browser did not identify itself as Safe Exam Browser" means the exam was opened in an ordinary browser, or that version is older than 3.4. A different web address means the file came from somewhere other than this exam — download it again. A file that is not this exam's means the computer still holds an older copy, so replace it. Put the problem right and run the check again on that same computer.
Browser Exam Keys, for papers that matter most
The exam file is not encrypted, so a pupil who has a copy and knows how could imitate it. For high-stakes papers, open the exam file in each Safe Exam Browser version's Config Tool, copy the Browser Exam Key it shows, and paste the keys, one per line, into "Browser Exam Keys" on the card. Do this as a save of its own, after the file exists — a save that generates the file and carries keys at the same time is refused, because a new file always has new keys. Every Safe Exam Browser version in your labs needs its own key listed, or those computers fail the check. Generating the exam file again clears the keys, so they must be read out of the new file and pasted again.
Changing your mind
Safe Exam Browser can be required only before anyone has started. It can be switched off at any time, with a reason once pupils have started. A pupil who uses a screen reader needs it allowed in the exam file by your IT support, or an exemption from Safe Exam Browser on the monitor. If you turn on webcam photos later, download the exam file again: the old one will no longer open the exam.
Entrance exams
Safe Exam Browser is not available for entrance exams yet: the "Safe Exam Browser" card does not appear on an exam for applicants. For an entrance exam that matters, hold it at school, tick "Require full screen" and set an exit limit on the "Screen rules" card.
Keep invigilating
Safe Exam Browser locks only the computer it runs on. It does not stop a second device, a phone or a person, and neither do webcam photos. A teacher walking the room is still the safeguard that works.
Still stuck?
Email info@tocel.ng and tell us which guide you were following.