Kudos for your frank comments and your calm disclosure (didn’t see the group, don’t know the assignments). To me the virtual group differs little from a face-to-face one. I doubt Ryerson plans to issue baby monitors to those f2f groups (to make sure no one discusses answers they’re not supposed to).

One other element, I think, is that students in this sort of institution need a culture in which both collaboration and self-direction can occur. In other words, the norm becomes: you don’t copy answers on tests, your courses encourage collaboration, your courses make explicit sensible guidelines.