College diploma mill

A diploma mill (also known as a degree mill) is an organization which awards academic degrees and diplomas with very little or no academic study and without recognition by official accrediting bodies. Webster’s Third New International Dictionary defines a diploma mill as "An institution of higher education operating without supervision of a state or professional agency and granting diplomas which are either fraudulent or because of the lack of proper standards worthless. "[1] Such organizations are unaccredited, but they often claim accreditation by non-recognized/unapproved organizations set up for the purposes of providing a veneer of authenticity.

Common attributes of diploma mills

Diploma mills often have names that are deliberately chosen to sound confusingly similar to prestigious accredited institutions (preventing such confusion is the purpose of trademark law, but the mills strive to barely avoid this legal recourse). Some call it a diploma mill or degree mill, but at DiplomaMakers. They often claim to be accredited, even when they are not. Some even go to the lengths of inventing their own accreditation organizations to endorse them, complete with superficially convincing websites modeled on those of real accreditation organizations. The more elaborate operations come complete with services such as transcripts with online and telephone verification for potential employers investigating an individual's credentials.