English Olympiad Year 11 Reading Test 4

Do English Olympiad Year 11 Reading Test 4 to improve your reading skills and prepare for English Olympiad and an exam.

Reading Comprehension Test for Year 11 Students
Level B2/C1

English Olympiad Year 11 Reading Test 4 Text 1

How AI Voice Cloning Is Changing Scams

C1 Reading Test

Read the text about how AI voice cloning is changing scams. For questions 1 to 6, choose the correct sentence for each gap. There is one extra sentence that you do not need to use.

1 ____

At a security conference, the audience was played a call from a supposed kidnapper, followed by a girl’s voice begging her father to pay a ransom. The speaker paused and said, “Frightening, right? How could the father have known it wasn’t really his daughter?”

The room went quiet.

Advances in artificial intelligence have made it possible to recreate a person’s voice from tiny fragments of audio, often scraped from social media, podcasts, or online videos. A handful of seconds can now produce a digital imitation capable of speaking, reacting, and sounding emotional. 2 ____ That’s what makes it dangerous.

“One of the biggest changes is that scams no longer feel like scams,” a cybersecurity researcher told me. “They feel like everyday conversations.”

3 ____ Unlike traditional fraud calls built around rigid scripts, these calls evolve as the target speaks. It is no longer a monologue. It is a dialogue with someone you know and trust — and that subtle shift changes everything.

The scale of the problem is already substantial. In a McAfee global study of 7,000 adults, roughly one in four respondents said they had been exposed, directly or indirectly, to an AI voice-cloning scam. About four in ten admitted they doubted their ability to accurately discern a real voice from a synthetic one.

4 ____ The caller presents a situation that cannot wait: a delayed payment, a frozen account, a legal problem, a family emergency. The story may differ, but the pressure is always the same.

“It’s like a psychological shortcut,” one fraud analyst explained. “Urgency from a ‘reliable’ source short-circuits reflection. People don’t verify. They comply.”

What makes matters worse is that this technology is no longer confined to specialist circles. 5 ____ In other words, the gatekeepers have vanished.

Law and regulation, by contrast, move slowly. Some countries have begun drafting rules around AI-generated content, while others are still debating how existing laws should apply. At the same time, privacy regulations can restrict real-time information sharing between banks, telecom companies, and law enforcement. 6 ____

So where does that leave the rest of us?

Experts tend to agree there is no single fix. Technology helps. Legislation helps. But broadly speaking, the most effective defence remains an old-fashioned one: awareness and suspicion.

Anyone who pauses when faced with an urgent demand immediately weakens the scammer’s position. Anyone who verifies through a second channel buys time. And in this new landscape, time is the one thing scammers cannot afford.

AI may be learning to speak like us.

That doesn’t mean we have to listen.

Gap Fillers

A. Most attacks follow a familiar pattern.
B. Ironically, protections designed to safeguard users can also delay intervention.
C. Some experts believe the problem is still being underestimated by the general public.
D. The result is a new kind of scam that doesn’t shout or stumble. It sounds normal.
E. Tools that once required advanced technical knowledge are now packaged into user-friendly platforms.
F. The first time I heard an AI-cloned voice, I didn’t realise that’s what it was.
G. Modern voice-cloning systems can generate natural rhythm, realistic pauses, and spontaneous responses.

English Olympiad Year 11 Reading Test 4 Text 2

Read the radio programme. Our special guest is Angie Stone, an American soul singer and song-writer. Angie is going to share her heartbreaking life story with us.

I sometimes look at what’s happened in my life and wonder whether God’s used me as an example. No matter how beautiful and healthy you are, there’s always the chance this can be taken away from you. Maybe my life is a testimony to that. When I look at myself now, I see a beautiful woman who’s strong, independent, and ready to take on the world. But times have been hard and my body changed in ways I could never have foreseen. My childhood was an incredibly happy one; it was amazing in fact. I was an only child and very out-going. My mother doted on me, so I was always in the latest designs. Being really trend-conscious, I always adapted to the different fashions of the times. My body was perfect: I was the girl who had the best body – the kind that always attracted attention.

Then, when I was in my mid-twenties, it all changed. I was working at a chemical lab and was exposed to an air- born germ that derived from African tree sap. It got into my eyes and made its way in to my bloodstream and caused my body to stop draining fluids properly.
… Just as I was set to hit the big time – this happens, and you’re forced to meet the world in the worst shape of your life.
For years I was unhappy, I’d been given everything I’d dreamed of. And then I had to get on stage as a size 22, and not be able to explain why I was obese. I’d never eaten a lot, and had never planned for a life like this, so really I was just shocked.
… When you’ve spent years of your life struggling with something that is beyond your control – and which changes the way people see you – you lose a certain amount of control. But I’m set to get back in the driving seat; I won’t be broken down by things. It’s been a struggle; a journey if you like. But now I’ve arrived and I’m ready.

Decide if the statements are true (T) or false (F)

1. Angie claims that nothing can be taken for granted.
2. Angie has always had a presentiment that something would happen to her.
3. Angie’s Mom spoilt her.
4. Accidentally, Angie got infected at the lab.
5. Fans stopped visiting Angie’s concerts when her appearance changed.

English Olympiad Year 11 Reading Test 4 Text 3

Research into happiness is always open to questions. Do people, when asked, tell the truth about whether or not they are happy? Isn’t it peculiar to tell a complete stranger that you are miserable? Possibly. Nevertheless, people who fill in questionnaires without giving their names show the same sort of results as those in open interview. It might also be suggested that people do not know whether they are happy or not. But, if you believe that most people are aware of their own emotional state and express it honestly when asked, the research makes some fascinating discoveries.

It is interesting to note what does not necessarily make you happy. Class, wealth, social position, intelligence and race are poor indicators (although poverty is a good indicator of unhappiness). Women are slightly happier than men, and older people are more satisfied – though less joyful – than younger people. But most people are – or claim to be – happy. This is, surprisingly, the same for everyone. Whatever situation people are in, whether they are prisoners or lottery winners, roughly the same levels of happiness on average can be found. Most people score six or seven on a scale of one to ten.

Marriage is a greater source of happiness than being single. 35 per cent of married men and 41.5 per cent of married women claim to be very happy, whereas the figures for single men and women are 18.5 per cent and 25.5 per cent. However, having children is not the source of happiness many believe it to be. Survey after survey shows that happiness levels begin to fall after the birth of a child, reaching their lowest point in the teenage years and only returning to previous levels when children leave home. This is rather strange, since people keep on having kids despite the clear evidence that having children makes you less happy. One possible explanation is that there are things that people consider more valuable than happiness, like feeling of being worthwhile. Or maybe bad marriages stick together because of children.

Choose the correct letter A, B, C, or D.

Why would research into happiness be unreliable?
A. It isn’t possible to identify the people answering the questions
B. Those filling in questionnaires can copy other people’s answers
C. People don’t tell the truth when talking to strangers
D. People may not be sure of their own emotions
What did the researchers discover about levels of happiness?
A. A sudden change in circumstances can make people less happy
B. Childhood is the happiest time of life
C. There is little variation from one person to the next
D. Successful people are more likely to be happy
According to the research, which people would be the happiest?
A. Single people
B. The parents of teenagers
C. Married couples with a new baby
D. Married couples without children
According to the research, it is difficult to explain why people …
A. remain married in spite of being unhappy
B. consider marriage worthwhile
C. continue to have children
D. value happiness more than anything else
In general, the writer thinks the results of the research are …
A. incorrect
B. unreliable
C. unexpected
D. unfair

English Olympiad Year 11 Reading Test 4 Text 4

In the Dark

In 1989, a young Italian designer by the name of Stefania Follini entered a cave near Carlsbad, New Mexico, and stayed there for 131 days. Follini was a part of an experiment to determine how isolation and the absence of time cues affect the mind and body. For more than four months, she lived inside the Carlsbad cave in a 20-foot Plexiglas module. While she was living in the cave, she had no way of measuring time. No natural light reached her living space and she had neither a watch nor a clock.
How did Follini react to the isolation? During the first days of the experiment, Follini seemed tense and depressed. She got irritated when researchers outside the cave requested routine report, and she had trouble concentrating. But this changed as soon as she established a regular routine. As part of this routine, Follini measured her body temperature, heart rate, and blood pressure as soon as she woke up. Researchers above ground received the results through a computer link up. Exercise and breakfast came next in her schedule. Then she filled the rest of the time before lunch by playing cards or playing her guitar and sometimes by drawing. After lunch she read and took a nap. When she woke up from her nap, she frequently practiced judo (she has a brown belt) and then after supper, she read until she fell asleep.
However her body rhythms affected during the experiment. When Follini entered the cave, her body rhythms were on a 24-hour cycle. Within a few days, however, this rhythm began to change. She went to bed later and later every night. Eventually she was staying awake for 30 hours at a time and then sleeping for 22 to 24 hours.
The results of this experiment will help researchers learn more about body’s natural rhythms. With this information, researchers may be able to help people adjust to new routines and cope with unusual work schedules and long trips. With a better understanding of body rhythms, we may also find that we have a lot more energy than we realized.

Decide if the statements are true or false

This experiment took place in 1987.
The experiment showed that the absence of time cues does not affect the body.
Follini was not able to exercise while she was in the cave.
Her “days” got longer and longer while she was in the cave.
Her body rhythms stayed about the same throughout the experiment.

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