<![CDATA[This article examines academic task outsourcing among students at Campus 1, Faculty of Ushuluddin and Dakwah, IAIN Sultan Amai Gorontalo, as both an academic-integrity problem and a socio-religious phenomenon. Rather than treating task outsourcing merely as a rule violation, the study explores how students interpret, negotiate, and normalize the practice within an Islamic higher-education setting that normatively emphasizes trustworthiness, honesty, and responsibility. A qualitative phenomenological design was employed through observation, semi-structured interviews with five students, documentation, and one lecturer interview for triangulation. Data were interpreted through an interactive thematic procedure combining the Theory of Planned Behavior, contract-cheating scholarship, and a lived-religion perspective. The findings show that task outsourcing operates through peer networks and social media, particularly WhatsApp, using simple transactional arrangements, affordable prices, and increased demand during periods of heavy workload and tight deadlines. Students do not always understand the practice as serious cheating; under particular circumstances it is rationalized as help, a shortcut, or an academic survival strategy. This reveals a gap between normatively known religious morality and morality enacted in everyday academic life. Accordingly, prevention requires more than sanctions: meaningful assessment design, academic-integrity literacy, accessible academic support, stronger lecturer-student relations, and the practical internalization of religious ethics are also necessary.]]>
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