A former college student who was expelled after using AI in job hunting starts an AI cheating tool company called 'Cluely' and raises 740 million yen in funding



A Columbia University student who used AI to pass a coding exam and received job offers from major companies like Amazon, Meta, and TikTok spread the word about it on social media and was expelled. He then founded a startup that promised to 'cheat on anything' using AI, and successfully raised $5.3 million (about 740 million yen).



Columbia student suspended over interview cheating tool raises $5.3M to 'cheat on everything' | TechCrunch
https://techcrunch.com/2025/04/21/columbia-student-suspended-over-interview-cheating-tool-raises-5-3m-to-cheat-on-everything/

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https://decrypt.co/315687/finally-an-ai-that-helps-dishonest-morons-look-smart

The reason why 21-year-old former Columbia University student Chung-Gin Lee started the AI company Cluely was because he was expelled from college after using AI in a coding test during a job interview at an IT company. However, Lee said he had no intention of getting a job in the first place.

While studying computer science at Columbia University with the aim of starting his own business, Lee met like-minded colleague Neil Shanmugam and developed several apps and AI services while at university, but things didn't go as planned.



So, Lee decided to start by creating a buzz, and developed an AI tool called 'Interview Coder' to cheat on the coding interview platform LeetCode . He received internship offers from major IT companies such as Meta, TikTok, Amazon, and Capital One, and published them on Linkedin as his work history. However, his Linkedin account was banned because it was not proof of work history.



In particular, he recorded the entire process of the Amazon exam, from the online assessment to receiving an offer, and uploaded it to YouTube. This video made Lee famous, but all of the videos were deleted by Amazon.

Shortly after, Lee received a notice from Columbia University warning him that using Interview Coder was a violation of school rules. According to Lee, this was because Amazon executives had pressured Columbia to 'terminate the student or else Columbia would not hire him.'

Lee, who also posted the university's notice on social media, was now officially expelled, this time for 'distributing classified documents.'



However, Lee's plan to make his name known and achieve his dream was a great success. Based on Interview Coder, Lee's AI startup 'Cluely,' co-founded with Shanmugam, who was also expelled from Columbia University, caught the eye of venture capitalists, and Cluely successfully raised a total of $5.3 million.

Lee has created a video that visualizes what it would be like to use Cluely, which has also become a hot topic.



However, using AI to woo women, as in this video, is not Cluely's original purpose. Released in April 2025, Cluely is a Mac application powered by OpenAI's AI that runs in the background and is able to evade detection systems that prevent test takers from opening something to cheat. Lee also said that a Windows version is in the works.

Thus launched, Cluely declared in its manifesto , 'We will 'cheat' at everything. The world will call it cheating. We did it with calculators, spell checkers, and Google. Every time technology makes us smarter, the world panics, then adapts, and suddenly forgets as if it were the norm. But this time it's different. AI isn't just a tool; it's going to redefine how our world works. The future doesn't reward effort anymore, it rewards influence. So let's start cheating. When everyone cheats, it won't be cheating.'



'I thought I had ruined my career and my studies just for the sake of YouTube views,' said Lee, who said the most courage he needed was when he made a video about cheating at an Amazon interview. 'Trust yourself and your intuition more and trust what other people say less. In reality, risky things are not as risky as they seem. Take more risks.'



In response to an interview with IT news site TechCrunch, Amazon declined to comment on individual cases, but said that candidates must pledge not to use fraudulent tools during the interview.

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in Software,   Video, Posted by log1l_ks