CENTRE FOR RESEARCH
ANNA UNIVERSITY
CHENNAI – 600 025
Dr. JAYAVEL R
Director
Office :+91 44 2235 7366
+91 44 2235 0361
Fax : +91 44 2220 1213
Ref. No. CFR/fake-journals-guidelines-circular/JUN-16 Date: 25.06.2016
FAKE – JOURNALS – IMPORTANT GUIDELINES
Of late it has been noticed that, a section of Research Community is falling prey to fake Journals
which are
imitations
of popular
and
well established Journals,
and
so a matter
of serious concern.
Publishers of fake journals constantly allure authors to publish articles in their journals. They
charge huge sums in the name of article processing fees and publish papers
without any
review
process,
in no time. Research scholars are automatically
attracted to such quick and easy publication offers and are becoming victims of
such illegal practices. In the process, researchers are losing their effort, time, content, money, reputation, peace of
mind and above all credibility.
The common
attributes
of any Journal are, Journal
Name,
Publisher
Name, ISSN No. (print / online), Country and language of publication, Website
/ Homepage / URL, frequency of publication, article processing fee, scope of publication, Editorial board, Review process.
It is not feasible for Centre for Research to
establish the authenticity of over
40000 Journals
listed on
its website. Scholars and researchers may note that, the absence of authentic
URL for a Journal in the list (given on the website at the end of Annexure-
1/Updated list 2016) does not entitle them
to publish papers in their fake counterparts.
Articles published or
accepted for
publication in such counterfeit journals
and
claimed for
synopsis / Thesis / Supervisor Recognition will be
summarily
rejected and stern action will be taken as per regulations. Centre for Research will not be responsible for any act of scholars publishing articles in fake journals, either out
of
ignorance or due
to oversight. It is therefore important that researchers are to be vigilant at all the times while submitting their articles to online Journals. Centre for Research will thoroughly verify the
authenticity of every journal publication by research scholars / academicians, before processing.
The following are
some
guidelines issued in the interest of
Research community:
Most of the fake journals are imitations of popular Journals that existed for
a while.
Some of the fake journal websites have conveniently
imitated Journals that
originate from Non-English speaking countries.
The websites of fake journals appear exactly similar to that of their authentic
counterparts. The Journal Name, ISSN No., Logos, and any other major
features of authentic journal, appear exactly the same on the website of bogus journal.
The fake journals are different from their authentic counterparts in some / all of
the
following:
URL of the website, geographical location of the servers, country
of Journal, Editorial Board, email
or contact
details, Postal Address, submission-to- publication time, peer-review process, scope
of publication.
Geographical location of the servers can be obtained by checking the
URL
of
If you come across two Journals with the same name and ISSN No., but
having different URLs, you may suspect one of them to be fake. You may
send a request email to the
one you feel as trustworthy, for information about
authenticity of the other suspecting URL. Journal Databases, Thomson
Reuters, Research Gate, or some third party websites may be useful sources of
information for establishing the authenticity of a Journal.
On a general note, the authentic ones do not charge, while the fake ones charge hefty article processing fees. Moreover publication in a fake journal is easy and quick, and there
is
no peer review process. Anything submitted to
such journals simply gets accepted and once
the
publication fee is paid the article
gets published in no time.
The fake
journals ensure
that their names and websites appear
in
the top few
while
googling, so that authors are attracted.
It is also recommended that authors may send request emails to any
of the
trustworthy third-party websites and clarify the authenticity of
a Journal.
Sd/ DIRECTOR
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