Anna Abalkina
@abalkina.bsky.social
Researcher at FU Berlin •Nature's 10 2024 •Creator of RW #Hijackedjournals checker •Scientific misconduct •Plagiarism • #papermills •Corruption in higher education www.abalkina.com
My new post on the Tanu.pro paper mill in Italy. The paper mill has launched an aggressive marketing campaign in Italy to increase the H-index. It makes an impression that they are just expanding in Italy, but they have been present there for a long time. www.roars.it/fabbriche-di... #papermills
#WCRI2026 is over. I would like to share the summary of several presentations on paper mills. abalkina.com/wcri-2026-pa... abalkina.com/wcri-2026-pa... Part 3 will be released soon.
WCRI 2026 (Part 1) - Anna Abalkina
World Congress on Research Integrity 2026, for the first time, included dozens of presentations on paper mills, organizations that sell papers, co-authorship
abalkina.com
I'm excited to share our new preprint on paper mills in conferences. We explored 200+ social media channels that promoted offers for sale and identified 1,720 papers published in 286 IEEE conferences. We found some 🚩: six-author co-authorship and affiliation diversity arxiv.org/abs/2604.22458
I'm excited to make a presentation at WCRI in May 2026. With my co-authors ( @solalpirelli.bsky.social , Yagmur Ozturk and Marie Kunešová), we explore paper mills in conferences, a topic which is not well studied in the literature. I will be happy to meet my friends there and make new ones!
I was delighted to learn that Elisabeth Bik (@elisabethbik.bsky.social) finds inspiration in my work. Thank you, Elisabeth, for the nomination. I truly appreciate your support! www.nature.com/articles/d41...
@sjmelchor.bsky.social writes for @nature.com about how to spot dubious papers, interviewing @elisabethbik.bsky.social, @abalkina.bsky.social, @jabyrnesci.bsky.social, myself and and my fellow @cosig.net maintainers @solalpirelli.bsky.social and Yagmur Ozturk! www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Five ways to spot when a paper is a fraud
Science sleuths share their common-sense tips for sniffing out fishy articles.
nature.com
I was delighted to speak at the Symposium der Ombudspersonen für Gute Wissenschaftliche Praxis in Deutschland about the challenges posed by #papermills. Commercialization of fraud threatens research integrity, undermines the reliability of data,& leads to significant losses of time & resources 1/3
Hi, I'll have a look. My spreadsheets cover mainly paper mill papers. The one with fake authors is quite small now.
This is a new phenomenon and business model exploiting gaps in publishing. The cartel uses fake names to produce AI-written or plagiarised papers. Reference lists contain 100s of paid entries.If papers are retracted, no real authors are punished, and citations still count, even from retracted papers
Dalmeet Singh Chawla@dalmeet.bsky.social · 7mo agoCitation cartels are now using journal waivers and fake author names to target reputed chemistry journals — my latest for @cenmag.bsky.social: cen.acs.org/research-int... @abalkina.bsky.social, @smutclyde.bsky.social, @mumumouse2.bsky.social
Excited to be participating in the virtual Research Integrity Week events, by the Researchers Society/Pakistan Economics Frontier, organized by Abbas Aziz, hosted by Dr. Saba Saeed, with @sholtodavid.bsky.social , @abalkina.bsky.social, Najma Memon, and @reeserichardson.bsky.social Starting in 2h
@Abalkina.bsky.social on eerie new papermill strategy #APE2026: invented papers with fake authors & paid for references for H-index padding. Even on retraction, citations persist. Remedy: 1) prepublication integrity screening; 2) remove H-index from Research assemment @Dorassessment.bsky.social
Happy Advent!🎄 Day 24 Ready for a new puzzle? A case from a paper that was published some days ago papermills.tilda.ws/2025advent24 papermills.tilda.ws/advent2025 This is the last case of 2025. I hope you enjoyed the calendar as much as I enjoyed preparing it, and I wish you warm seasonal greetings!
Theatre performances in Berlin are very particular - many of them have political vibes, even when it’s classical repertoire. I was at the opera Don Giovanni, and halfway through there was a notice: Don Ottavio’s aria “Il mio tesoro” would be skipped due to cuts in Berlin’s cultural funding.
Happy Advent! !!!🎄✨ Day 23. Ready for a new puzzle? Today's puzzle is related to journal's inconsistencies. papermills.tilda.ws/2025advent23 papermills.tilda.ws/advent2025
Happy Advent! !!!🎄✨ Day 19. Ready for a new puzzle? Do you see inconsistencies between two tables? papermills.tilda.ws/2025advent19 papermills.tilda.ws/advent2025
Happy Advent! !!!🎄✨ Day 17. Ready for a new puzzle? Another paper-mill paper. Do you see inconsistencies? papermills.tilda.ws/2025advent17 papermills.tilda.ws/advent2025
The last session of the year. We had a funny Mentimeter: what if Santa had a development agency (the course is related to development and development aid). It was fun!
Happy Advent! !!!🎄✨ Day 16. Ready for a new puzzle? Inconsistency case in a paper-mill paper. papermills.tilda.ws/advent2025
Preparing for the last teaching sessions of the year. I do a funny quiz for my students: If Santa ran a development agency, how would he decide who gets support?
Happy Advent! !!!🎄✨ Day 15. Ready for a new puzzle? This is one of my favorite cases of 2025. papermills.tilda.ws/advent2025
Happy Advent! !!!🎄✨ Day 8. Today's puzzle is about figure inconsistencies! Do you spot the problem? papermills.tilda.ws/advent2025
Happy Advent! !!!🎄✨ Day 7. Could you identify any issues in the demographic data? papermills.tilda.ws/advent2025
Happy Advent! !!!🎄✨ Day 6. Today's puzzle is about reference list! Do you spot the problem? papermills.tilda.ws/advent2025
We see a new phenomenon. Fake authors in papers with hundreds of citations. Papers are easy to produce by ChatGPT. Even if a paper is retracted, no punishment to the real authors, but citations still count. Today's puzzle is about a similar case papermills.tilda.ws/2025advent4
Advent2025 4
papermills.tilda.ws
Happy Advent! !!!🎄✨ Day 4. Today's puzzle is about new cases and the phenomenon of problematic papers. papermills.tilda.ws/advent2025
Happy Advent! !!!🎄✨ Day 3. Today's puzzle is about hijacked journals. papermills.tilda.ws/advent2025
