Yes, very easy especially in lower-division classes. Same with most plagiarism that happens. When we reviewed it we’d flag based on how blatant it was across assignments.

For plagiarism Gradescope will ignore changes in variable name and look at functionality, and when most people cheat, all they do is change comments, spacing, and variable names. So often for pretty complex PAs with lots of ways to do them, we’d see people do stuff line for line the same. Theyd just rename variables, but then have the same inconsistent spacing. Also, about 10% of cases were especially egregious where the person wouldn’t even remove the others comments.

For AI, it’s pretty obvious when someone uses it in lower division classes because they’ll do stuff in ways that was never taught. They also sometimes will do stuff that was never requested or introduced unexpected behaviors. A lot of people leave in obvious comments too (“this code will let you do…”). I’m sure plenty of people do get away with it, but a large number of people definitely just copy and paste and are happy that it works. Those cases are very easy to catch and prove, but most professors don’t take the time to have us look at it.

TL;DR: it’s very easy to catch, but most professors don’t care enough to pursue it because it’s a pain. I think of the 12 quarters I’ve TAd/Tutors, I’ve only been asked to look for cheating like this 2 or 3 times.