Predatory publishers are a growing phenomenon in scholarly communication that threatens the transparency, quality, and reliability of research. These are publishing entities that exploit the open access model with the primary aim of financial profit, bypassing fundamental processes such as peer review, editorial oversight, and the assurance of scientific validity.
Predatory publishers often employ deceptive practices such as:
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Sending mass, unsolicited invitations to researchers to submit articles or join editorial boards.
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Imitating the names or design of reputable journals.
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Publishing articles with minimal or no scientific review.
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Charging excessive publication fees without providing corresponding services.
The result is the dissemination of unreliable, and sometimes false, research data, which can mislead other scientists, policymakers, and the wider public.
Moreover, collaborating with such publishers can harm the academic reputation of researchers, especially early-career scholars who may not yet be familiar with these practices.
To help identify and avoid predatory publishers, tools and initiatives have been developed such as Think. Check. Submit., the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), and the JUFO portal, an online platform in Finland supporting the evaluation of the quality of scholarly publications. In addition, university libraries and research support offices play an important role in educating researchers, offering reliable resources and guidance for selecting reputable scientific journals.
Addressing this phenomenon requires collective effort and the strengthening of scholarly literacy to safeguard the quality of research output and maintain society’s trust in science.
Predatory Journals
Predatory journals exploit the gold open access route, generating increasing profits through Article Processing Charges (APCs), while the peer review process is degraded in quality or practically absent. This allows the rapid publication of academic work without guarantees of quality or reliability. On the other hand, lack of awareness and information about this issue leads to an increase in publications in such journals by researchers, who often unknowingly (or sometimes deliberately) legitimize and amplify the reach of predatory journals.
Criteria that have been proposed to identify predatory journals include:
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Similarity of titles to those of established reputable journals.
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APCs: Publication costs are usually lower than those of established open access journals.
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Publication frequency: Irregular frequency, or regular frequency with the addition of dozens or even hundreds of special issues. Very often, oversized journals publish more than 3,000 articles per year.
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Editorial board size: Editorial boards may include several hundred members, mostly from developing countries.
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Peer review process: The peer review process is unusually short.
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Impact factor and self-citations: While self-citations in Web of Science usually range between 0–15%, in predatory journals the percentage typically exceeds 25%.
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Aggressive marketing: Researchers are bombarded with spam inviting them to publish, review, or edit for predatory journals. Often, PhD candidates or even master’s students are invited to edit special issues. Discount vouchers for reduced APCs are also commonly offered.
Further Reading
Articles:Websites:
- Predatory publishing: Understanding predatory publishing, Unversity of Salisbury, libguides, access 4/6/2025.
- Predatory publishing. Clarkson University (ΗΠΑ), Guides, access 5/6/2025.
- Predatory and questionable publishing practices. Maastricht University (Ολλανδία), OA publishing guides, access 5/6/2025.
- Predatory publishing. Yale University (ΗΠΑ), access 5/6/2025.
- Evaluating journals and conferences & avoiding predatory publishers. University of California, San Francisco (ΗΠΑ), access 5/6/2025.
- Predatory publishing. Curtin University (Αυστραλία), access 5/6/2025.
- Predatory publishers and conferences.University of Aberdeen (Ηνωμένο Βασίλειο), access 5/6/2025.
- COPE: Promoting integrity in scholarly research and its publication, access 5/6/2025.
- Evaluating publishing options. Scholarly Communication Unit, HEAL-Link. Accessed 10/7/2025.