Deceptive Publishers

It is important to note that the presence of one single issue does not necessarily mean the journal is fraudulent. Some of the most common traits of predatory publishers include:

• Relentless spam email asking authors to submit their manuscript to journals or conferences outside their disciplinary area of study.
• A publisher started tens or dozens of journals all at once, many of which have very few articles published per issue.
• Spelling or grammar errors.
• No peer review, or even reading of the manuscript before accepting for publication.

​Editorial policies should be posted on the journal's website. They should be clearly explained and include specific expectations for authors. Deceptive practices to look out for include:

• Journal fails to disclose editorial policies
• Journal fails to list editor or editorial board members
• Journal fails to disclose article processing charges
• Journal fails to provide contact information or business address
• The only contact for the journal is an online form or editor@[insert journal domain name]
• Little or no information about peer-review

• Journal name mimics the name of established, reputable journal.
• Journal name does not reflect geographic location of journal. (If the journal name indicates it is the European Journal of XYZ, the publisher's address should be in Europe.)
• Journal falsely claims to be indexed in reputable abstracting/indexing services. This can be independently verified by visiting the database and checking to see if it is indexed there. Purdue University Libraries provides free access to a host of reputable abstracting and indexing services for the Purdue University community.
• Journal lists fraudulent abstracting/indexing services. There are fake indexing services out there. If you have questions, consult your Subject Librarian.
• Journal lists abstracting/indexing services that are not abstracting/indexing services. Abstracting and indexing services provide article level metadata records. This allows researchers to search the content of the journal. (What is the title, author, and abstract of each article?) Often, deceptive publishers will list "abstracting and indexing services" that only list information about the Journal--the Journal name, location, and web address, NOT article level information.
• Journal lies about business location, listing fake business address. The business location should not be a "virtual mailbox", shared with multiple other businesses. Independently verify the business address. Google is quite helpful with this one.
• Journal falsely claims to use DOIs. Independently verify the DOI has been registered at the International DOI Foundation.
• Journal claims to use mimic DOIs, but the links are part of the publisher's website domain. (For example, a website located at www.HelloWorld.com may have an article with a number that looks like a DOI, but the link to the DOI has "HelloWorld.com" at the end of the DOI link.)
• Journal claims to have an ISSN or fails to register ISSNs. Independently verify at the ISSN Registry Portal.
• Journal lists people on the editorial board who did not agree to serve.
• Journal falsely claims to have an impact factor, or uses some other false citation metric. Impact Factor is compiled by Clarivate Analytics (formerly Thomson Reuters). If the journal is not indexed by Clarivate Analytics, they do not have an Impact Factor.