How to Avoid Deceptive Publishers

‘Deceptive publishers’ (also commonly referred to as ‘predatory journals’) are for-profit entities that purport to publish high-quality academic research, but who do not follow accepted scholarly publishing best practices. Their ultimate goal is to make money, not publish quality research. A deceptive publisher may acquire the copyright to your research but never publish. A deceptive publisher may publish your work, but then disappear, resulting in the lack of a public record of your published article. Being associated with a deceptive publisher can lead to financial loss as a result of inappropriate fees and harm to your reputation.

U of T has created an informative deceptive publishers website and checklist that you can use to help identify a potentially predatory journal or deceptive publisher and avoid submitting research data to one of these entities.

• Identifying Deceptive Publishers: A Checklist

• Provide awareness to the University community about the existence of deceptive publishers
• Work with researchers and the U of T Libraries to educate researchers on the benefits of publishing in reputable journals