The publisher Frontiers has begun retracting a batch of 122 articles across five journals after an investigation found a network of authors and editors engaged in “unethical actions” such as manipulating citations and reviewing papers without disclosing conflicts of interest.
The publisher’s research integrity team has identified more than 4,000 articles linked to the network in journals owned by seven other companies, according to a company statement. The team said it is willing to share details and the methodology of their investigation with other publishers upon request. The company is a member of the STM Hub, a platform publishers use to share such information.
As the publishing industry comes to grips with its paper mill problem, many firms have issued retractions in bulk. Frontiers retracted a batch of 40 in 2023, and a dozen the year before.
The latest tranche of retractions began to appear July 28. By our count, at least 25 were posted that day. According to one of the notices, which are identical for each paper, the publisher’s investigation “identified this article as one for which the integrity of the peer review process has been undermined, resulting in the loss of confidence in the article’s findings.”
The investigation “was not able to determine whether all authors, editors, or reviewers were aware of or involved in the misconduct, but this misconduct was significant enough to determine that the scientific integrity of the article cannot be guaranteed,” the notices state.
A list of the forthcoming retractions Frontiers provided us names one paper from Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, six from Frontiers in Public Health, 29 from Frontiers in Energy Research, 33 from Frontiers in Environmental Science, and 53 from Frontiers in Psychology. Most were published in 2022.
The investigation began after a reader noted undisclosed conflicts of interest in the peer review of a single paper, according to the statement. PubPeer user “Desmococcus antarctica” has posted comments on some of the papers to be retracted, identifying instances in which an author and reviewer had previously coauthored a paper together.
After the first tip, the research integrity team began investigating all the authors’ previous submissions, publications, and coauthor networks, the publisher’s statement said.
“As the investigation proceeded, it became clear that a broad and sophisticated network of about 35 authors were potentially colluding over a very large number of journals and published papers, a fraction of which were published by Frontiers,” according to the statement.
Frontiers has an artificial intelligence review system for submitted manuscripts, which now includes verification of the reviewers’ and handling editors’ conflict of interest statements, the company said.
One of Desmococcus antarctica’s comments on PubPeer pertains to “Households’ Perception and Environmentally Friendly Technology Adoption: Implications for Energy Efficiency,” published in 2022 in Frontiers in Energy Research. The user pointed out that reviewer Muhammad Mohsin, an associate professor in the school of finance and economics at Jiangsu University in China, had previously coauthored a paper with one of the authors.
Mohsin also served as an editor for the collection in which the paper appeared. Many papers from the collection, which Frontiers calls a “Research Topic,” have been retracted, and Mohsin is listed as the handling editor on several. He did not immediately respond to our request for comment.
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Link to the statement from Frontiers: https://www.frontiersin.org/news/2025/07/29/frontiers-research-integrity-team-uncovers-peer-review-manipulation-network
Sometimes it seems like big publishers knowingly publish unethical papers. It feels as if they prefer to let these papers go online and then retract them in bulk later, rather than properly enforcing a rigorous peer-review process to prevent such papers from being published in the first place. They charge over $2,000 per paper—what exactly are the authors paying for? A polished PDF? Retractions are starting to look like a profitable business since hundreds of paying authors never get refunds. Even worse, the spread of false science can be dangerous for society. And you know what really frustrates me? Everyone in the scientific community is aware of this.
I would like to raise a few counter arguments:
1° I would prefer journals to accept rubbish/fake papers and then retract them. At least this way the authors will learn or will be documented to be part of fraudulent practices. If the journals stop the fraud (before publishing) the frauds will just learn, improve the paper and publish somewhere else (without people able to catch the fraud).
2° Not sure ‘what exactly are the authors paying for’ as argument means here. If you go gambling and lose your money, you lost it. If you pay to be an on a paper (knowingly it’s fake/not acceptable) and you lose the paper, too bad, you took a gamble. See also 1: I am glad these people lost their money, let it be a lesson to them.
3° Your statement ‘everyone’ in the scientific community is aware of this? I beg to differ! The majority is unaware/doesn’t care or keeps pushing the narrative that fraud in publications is a marginal event (<0.1 or <1%). It's not! It's a major problem and the majority of scientists still ignores or denies it.
I am inclined to agree with this, having been of the opposite view earlier. The onus is on scientists to read and understand papers, not blindly accept that “peer review” is some stamp of authority in spite of what bioRxiv claim “This article is a preprint and has not been certified by peer review [what does this mean?].”
Whatever the % of dodgy papers is, I suggest more common is simply irrelevant flim flam almost certainly seldom ever read or cited. It is also clear that many citations are made without the citing authors having read the paper, or simply citing papers from someones else’s Introduction section.
So whats the point of peer review then? Peer review is a ‘certification’ not only for other scientists, but also for the general society.
For me, the problem lies on the fact that many scientists believe that science is made for themselves, when in fact it is done for the collective interest.
Also, about the point raised by Blake, the money for publishing these fake papers do not come from the authors themselves, but in many cases, from public funding. Therefore, predatory publishers are taking this money not from the individuals, but from the tax payers.
Regarding the money been taken for public funding: that’s indeed an issue, but you can only stop this by having the authors getting many retractions, only then (sometimes) they are prevented from getting more funding.
I fear in order to really tackle this problem drastic measurements need to be taken, involving a legal approach but for ‘the law’ this type of fraud is irrelevant.
I agree, particularly with your statement regarding predatory investors. Shameful.
Oh, wow… I didn’t realize how profitable this practice is! Be a decent gatekeeper and prevent unethical papers from publishing –> the publisher gets $0; publish those papers then retract them –> the publisher gets $2000+… then, yeah, there is no incentive at all for publishers to be good gatekeepers!
The thing is: if you prevent it, it will be published somewhere else! Unless authors are put on a blacklist you won’t stop it.
Nothing like a planted glowing review to ensure publication success, eh? We must remember that some authors, often women and minorities, obviously face discrimination in getting their articles published. Many also face governmental coercion to publish or perish, literally. Opposing these drastic incentives, recall that editors of “quality” medical journals often lack any intelligence at all, preferring “fairness” to competence and substituting unearned inclusivity for experienced competence. They insist upon reviewer recommendations from authors well known for their “big bang” social ineptitude, inviting this sort of “I’ll scratch your back if you scratch mine” activity both coniving and innocent.
The answer is not more automation. Artificial intelligence (A.I.) will never allow paradigm shifts, breakthrough articles with new thinking reaching new conclusions with old data because prejudice is baked in and AI can only accept regurgitation of an inept status quo, at least presently. While thorough, A.I. is hopelessly inept.
It seems to me that there is no solution. Firing all the women and minorities at great publishing houses would take all the fun out of being an editor, since getting paid big salaries and loving it requires good-looking women in “obvious good health” along with Saudi and Quatari paper mill cash infusions.
Prejudice, incompetence, and group think are by no means recent phenomena. Medicine has been too big for its britches for quite some time now. Crawford W. Long, MD, will never receive proper credit for his invention of anesthesia so long as vast murals of deceit thrive among Long usurpers descendents at the New England Journal of Medicine, a journal of loathsome reputation that should have collapsed from shame already. A.I. may discover ancient bias to account for medicine’s lack of real progress for so many generations, perhaps discrediting some Nobel Prize winners along the way, but those, too, will be suspect until some smarter brains take over publishing.
One of the reasons for retractions in Frontiers in Psychology may be that background checks of the articles are not done rigorously inspite of AI use.
Hardly surprising. Frontiers asked me to be an editor back when they started. They ticked plenty of boxes for inclusion on Beall’s List.
“identifying instances in which an author and reviewer had previously coauthored a paper together.” Since when is this such a deal-breaker? Some fields of science are so tiny that eliminating anyone who has ever worked together would eliminate nearly all possible peer reviewers. E.g., take one gravitational wave paper, with a few dozen (or hundred) coauthors on it — eliminate them all from ever reviewing one another’s papers? There would be no competent reviewers left. This seems overboard to me.
You are comparing apples to oranges. You need to address this case by case and there is more to it than just coauthoring ‘a paper’ together. Didn’t you read the statement by Frontiers or heck, even the article here?
Agree!
The Frontiers integrity team seems to have misunderstood this situation. We need to look into the investigation team to see if they may have overstepped their authority or misinterpreted the retraction policy. I suspect some individuals may be innocent. For instance, Frontiers has changed editors and reviewers during the review process, and not everyone likely remembers all their past collaborations. If someone happens to be listed as a co-author simply because of a connection, who can keep track of all that?
It’s risky for reviewers and editors to operate this way. We should fact-check before we serve as editors and reviewers. Otherwise, we might end up being seen as part of a collusion!
If that applies to all journals, I can imagine that many papers from top universities in the US could face retraction.
Citation collusion is also a joke. Everyone tends to share their output on social media. Anyone in the same network reading and citing it constitutes collusion. This team misinterpreted the rules as well. I’d wager only those living on a deserted island can avoid this issue. This means you shouldn’t cite your friends’ papers, even if their content is useful and relevant, nor should you cite the editor’s paper before submitting your own. Anyway, don’t bother citing papers from this journal. Let its impact factor drop to zero; all of Frontiers’ staff will be unemployed ^_^, thanks to this lousy team wakakakakakak.
Citing irrelevant papers is considered collusion, right? But according to this team, even citing relevant ones counts as collusion.
Can I warn editors of other journals: ‘Your journal has already cited me three times. If it keeps happening, I’ll get into trouble with Frontiers.’?
To all journal editors: Please monitor whether your journals have cited Frontiers’ publications by more than a few times—otherwise, you might be accused of collusion.
Anyway, can we withdraw our papers from this journal before that ridiculous team retract the paper?
In olden days, there was no funding. Resarch was a search for the truth. It was done just for the happiness it provides. With funding, research has become a lucrative job that attracts everyone irrespective of their interest in true research. Without funding, high-end research is just impossible. That is the problem. So, we have to continue with the present setup, where publications like ‘retraction watch’ has a crucial role.
In olden days there was no funding? Not sure I understand your point. Professors or their PhD students always had to get paid + the lab equipment as well. Or you mean they got just paid a fix stipend from the university per year and that was it?
For connectivity, see also https://forbetterscience.com/2023/11/28/environmental-pseudoscience-and-polluted-research/ – “Am I unjustly singling out Environmental Science and Pollution Research for too welcoming attitude to Iqbal’s citation vehicles? […] More than a half, 45 namely, were in the Garrigues’ journal, followed by Frontiers in Environmental Sciences (9), Elsevier’s Renewable Energy (8) and – surprise! – Frontiers in Psychology (8). The latter is a very obscure choice for this topic […]”
And also https://forbetterscience.com/2025/07/02/salesmen-of-green-economy-bullshit/ – “Other notable actors (more-or-less, ‘members of the papermill executive board,’ as a good approximation of their status) are Muhammad Mohsin, […]”
At least, a small fraction of the trash is being taken out by Frontiers – some three years late. Just like Springer retracted something from Env Sci Poll Res and Econ Change Restruct. On the contrary, Elsevier cannot even be bothered to perform a similar symbolic action.
Elsevier is the worst of the worst. However, they did start cleaning up to some extent in their environmental journals eg environmental research or chemosphere or even STOTEN, but indeed at a much lower rate. Although, I think many more retractions are coming! Although I fear it will stay at a certain, limited, number rather than cleaning up completely.
The worst is hower they know who the frauds are but refuse to stop them from publishing more (future) crap.
In June 2015, Retraction Watch referred to the publisher (Frontiers) as one with “a history of badly handled and controversial retractions and publishing decisions”.
Frontiers accepted lots of papers and received lots of money but retracted the papers without refund. Is retraction helping this publisher earn money in an unethical way, potentially damaging the authors by using their “sword” in hand?
From one of the Frontiers’ editors’ comments recently LinkedIn post by Ioana A. Cristea
“Oh please let’s stop being ridiculous here. I mean sure great for the team for paying attention and investigating, but the problem here is, as anyone who submitted to Frontiers knows if they are not hypocritical, that the review process was…minimal. I know we like to call that ‘rapid’. The reason to submit was usually wanting to get something published fast and without a lot of hassles. Sometimes that something was not bad, so the system held. Sometimes it was terrible. Sometimes maybe it was worse than terrible.
At least a while ago and for sure in the times when some of these articles now retracted were published, there were anecdotes (many) of the editor not being allowed to reject a paper.
Can we please stop framing these as if the papermills, researcher ‘cartels’ (hahaha) are the wolf and the publishers the three little pigs?
This was knowingly embedded in the system. Fast and furious publishing, of which Frontiers was one of the pioneers, really did mean that publishing would be easy. Everyone knew this and *wanted* this, from authors who submitted to the publisher who opened more and more Frontiers journals, special issues and all of that. This reflected directly in how editors were chosen and how they chose reviewers.
And please not the ‘but there were also good papers published in Frontiers’. Indeed. Not only does this not invalidate what I said, but I would bet many of these were good even *without* peer-review.
(Yes, in case anyone cares, I have some papers in Frontiers. After the last one, I promised myself I will never submit again, nor agree to having my name on any. This, kids, is called consumer pressure).”
Tim Ziermans:
Ioana A. Cristea, as former associate editor at one Frontiers journal I can also confirm that one of the damaging issues was indeed the increased difficulty of rejecting papers (vs the ease of accepting). I, and I hope many others, tried to address this & other issues with Frontiers/Editors for over a year, but it seemed impossible to make any changes. So, for the same reasons, I quit and now no longer submit to or review for Frontiers until at least their review system has improved. That said, I do also have positive experiences, but since you discouraged us from giving that response ;-), let me also just say that I’ve encountered many bad reviews and poor review processes outside of Frontiers as well, even for so-called ‘established’ or ‘top’ journals within my field. So while I share your scepticism, I do not see it so much as a Frontiers problem, but more as part of a general peer-review crisis. Especially now that AI reviews are starting to rear their ugly head.
Robin Kok:
Lead Research | PhD | Occupational & Digital Health Scientist | GDPR
Hear hear! The whole Frontiers system is rigged to push quick acceptance with minimal fuss (and to rake in that sweet APC). The one time I reviewed for Frontiers was also the last time as apparently my choices were:
1. Suggest rejection on a fatally flawed meta-analysis but get overruled by the two other reviewers, meaning a junk science paper gets published *with my name on it as a reviewer*
2. Stop being a killjoy and a threat to Frontier’s healthy EBITDA and remove myself from the review process entirely.
The journal should refund all fees for retracted papers to hold Frontiers accountable for acting as a poor gatekeeper while shifting responsibility to authors and harming their reputations.
The publisher must clarify its review process, beyond the roles of reviewers and editors. The high number of retractions each year signals that authors should avoid publishing with this journal, as acceptance does not guarantee a positive outcome.
The reasoning provided by the publisher suggests that this journal should be blacklisted. Unfortunately, those responsible seem to take pride in retracting papers, “Catriona L. Catriona L. Research Integrity Auditor Manager @ FrontiersResearch Integrity Auditor Manager” in LinkedIn “Proud Moment for Research Integrity at Frontiers”, which only highlights the deficiencies in the journal’s review and editing processes.
The retraction process is also questionable; the reasoning is unclear, suggesting that they want to accept papers regardless, leaving reviewers and editors with little power to say no. When Frontiers declares a retraction, it is final, raising the question of why such a publisher should exist. Should the retraction system continue to support these publishers? Why is Retraction Watch proud of this process?
Robinson:, “The journal should refund all fees for retracted papers to hold Frontiers accountable for acting as a poor gatekeeper while shifting responsibility to authors and harming their reputations.”
If I understand your suggestion correctly, this scheme would penalize Frontiers (they have to refund the APC), and give that money to people who have authored papers so awful they have been retracted. Is that your plan?
I get that this hypothetical scheme would penalize publishers (who of course will never submit to this), but I don’t understand how you think this will discourage fraudsters from submitting crappy research. It might result in the opposite effect: the fraudsters get their submission fee back for a fake paper and can submit it elsewhere. And just keep trying.
If I am misunderstanding you point, please feel free to clairify.
3 years retract 500 plus papers. If the publisher really good, they should have rejected over 80 percent of papers and only get published 300 plus in three years. Get 90 percent published but retracted the papers (I can’t understand why so many are retracted, just guess the publisher may have commit fraud). The publisher should share the data on how the investigation took place or they simply scam and get all money first.
I suggest all not to cite Frontiers papers or when remove all Frontiers papers when you see them being cited to avoid being marked as Paper Mill member (some journals asked why we cited retracted papers) and do not serve as reviewer or editor of this Frontiers as no one know which papers will be retracted.