Chungin “Roy” Lee, a sophomore at Columbia University, has thrust himself into the spotlight of the tech world by leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) to navigate the notoriously challenging technical interview process employed by leading technology firms. Lee, who developed an AI tool dubbed Interview Coder, claims it enabled him to secure internship offers from industry giants such as Amazon, Meta, TikTok, and Capital One. However, his actions have ignited a firestorm of debate about ethics, fairness, and the future of hiring in the tech sector, ultimately leading to rescinded offers and disciplinary action from his university.
The Genesis of Interview Coder
Roy Lee’s journey began with a frustration familiar to many aspiring software engineers: the grueling preparation for technical interviews, a rite of passage for securing coveted positions at top tech companies, often referred to collectively as FAANG (Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Google). These interviews typically involve solving complex coding problems in real time, often sourced from platforms like LeetCode, under the watchful eye of an interviewer. Lee, a self-described perfectionist, logged an astonishing 600 hours honing his skills on LeetCode, a popular training ground for such assessments. “It was one of the most miserable experiences I’ve ever had while programming,” he told Gizmodo in an interview with Matthew Gault. “It made me hate programming” (Gault, 2025).
Driven by this discontent, Lee engineered Interview Coder, an AI-powered tool designed to provide an undetectable advantage during virtual coding interviews. The tool reportedly uses advanced language models, such as ChatGPT, to analyze coding problems from a snapshot and generate solutions in real time. Lee boasted that it could bypass proctoring software intended to detect cheating, a claim he substantiated by recording and posting a full, unedited video of himself using the tool during an Amazon interview on YouTube (Lee, 2025, as cited in Hindustan Times, 2025). His demonstration was not merely a personal triumph but a public challenge to what he saw as an outdated and flawed hiring paradigm.
Success and Backlash
Lee’s gambit paid off initially. He secured internship offers from Amazon, Meta, TikTok, and Capital One, proudly displaying these achievements on his LinkedIn profile with start dates slated for February 2025. In posts on X, he quipped, “The funniest thing about all of this is that people think
@InterviewCoder
only works for Amazon. LOL. no one is safe,” suggesting the tool’s versatility across multiple companies (Lee, X, March 1, 2025). Yet, his victory was short-lived.
Just two days after his YouTube video gained traction, an anonymous tipster alerted Columbia University to Lee’s actions, accusing him of cheating. Amazon, in an email purportedly sent to the university, expressed dismay: “Chungin, or Roy as he prefers, recently interviewed for our Amazon SDE Intern role in which he proved to be a strong candidate. Soon after, I received a link to a YouTube video created by Roy in which he showed himself using an invisible cheating tool to gain an unfair and unapproved advantage during the interview process” (Hindustan Times, 2025). The email, whose authenticity has not been independently verified by all sources, also alleged that Lee was selling Interview Coder to other students and engineers, amplifying its reach.
Columbia University responded swiftly, forwarding a redacted version of the complaint to Lee and scheduling a disciplinary hearing for March 11, 2025. Amazon, meanwhile, indicated it would rescind its offer, citing its “long-standing partnership” with Columbia’s engineering division and its expectation of “proper action” from the university (Gault, 2025). Meta and Capital One followed suit, with Lee sharing screenshots of emails rescinding their offers as well (Lee, X, March 2, 2025). Amazon declined to comment directly on the matter but noted to Gizmodo that its “recruiting process is evolving,” hinting at potential adaptations to counter such tools (Gault, 2025).
Lee’s Defense and Broader Ambitions
Far from contrite, Lee doubled down on his stance. He told Gizmodo he had already rejected Amazon’s offer prior to its rescission, claiming his true intent was not to secure internships but to expose the deficiencies of LeetCode-style interviews. “Point of the software is to hopefully bring an end to Leetcode interviews. This tool took me a week to build and a better engineer could’ve built it in half a day,” he wrote on X (Lee, X, February 28, 2025). In his view, the reliance on algorithmic puzzles fails to reflect real-world programming skills, a sentiment echoed by some in the tech community who argue that such tests prioritize rote memorization over practical ability.
Lee’s critique extends beyond methodology to a bold prediction about the industry’s future. “Most human intelligence work is going to be obsolete in two years,” he asserted to Gizmodo. “So I have two years to make something happen” (Gault, 2025). Rather than attend the disciplinary hearing, Lee has opted to leave Columbia University altogether, booking a one-way ticket out of New York. He is now capitalizing on his notoriety by selling subscriptions to Interview Coder for $60 a month, marketing it as both a practical tool and a protest against conventional hiring practices (NDTV, 2025).
Implications for Tech Hiring
Lee’s saga has sparked widespread discussion within programming circles and beyond. On X, reactions ranged from admiration—“That’s why stop asking stupid and outdated questions; as now technology evolves, you should evolve” (News18, 2025)—to condemnation: “Cheating on digital interviews will just force companies back to doing in-person interviews (worse for workers)” (News18, 2025). His story, which went viral after his YouTube upload and subsequent posts on X, has amplified calls to rethink how tech talent is evaluated.
The rise of AI tools like Interview Coder poses existential questions for the industry. If such technologies can so easily undermine standardized assessments, are companies like Amazon and Meta over-reliant on a flawed metric? As Coursejoiner notes, “Roy Lee’s main goal wasn’t to get an internship. He wanted to prove that the way big tech companies do coding interviews (using a platform called LeetCode) is broken” (Coursejoiner, 2025). This perspective aligns with broader critiques that technical interviews may not accurately gauge a candidate’s ability to innovate or collaborate—skills increasingly vital in an AI-driven landscape.
Amazon’s acknowledgment of an evolving recruitment process suggests that Lee’s actions may accelerate changes already underway. Whether this means more robust anti-cheating measures, a shift to in-person evaluations, or a wholesale reimagining of candidate assessment remains unclear. For now, Lee’s experiment has laid bare both the ingenuity and the ethical quandaries of AI’s role in the job market.
Chungin “Roy” Lee’s use of AI to game virtual interview platforms has transcended a personal stunt to become a flashpoint in the ongoing evolution of tech hiring. His creation of Interview Coder—and the subsequent fallout—underscores the tension between innovation and integrity in an industry at a crossroads. As Lee exits Columbia to pursue his next venture, the tech world is left to grapple with the implications of his actions: a challenge to adapt, a warning of vulnerabilities, and a provocative vision of a future where traditional roles may indeed become obsolete.
Sources:
Gault, Matthew. “A Student Used AI to Beat Amazon’s Brutal Technical Interview. He Got an Offer and Someone Tattled to His University.” Gizmodo, March 4, 2025.
“Columbia student creates AI tool to easily land offers from Amazon, Meta, TikTok and more.” Hindustan Times, March 2, 2025.
“AI Tool Helps Columbia Student Land Internship Offers From Amazon, Meta And TikTok.” NDTV, March 2, 2025.
“AI Powerhouse: How One Tool Helped a Columbia Student Secure Top Internships at Amazon, Meta, and TikTok.” Coursejoiner, March 3, 2025.
“Student Develops AI Software To Crack Coding Job Interviews, Internet Calls It ‘Cheating.’” News18, March 2, 2025.
Lee, Roy. Posts on X, February 28–March 6, 2025.
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