Nineteen journals shut down by Wiley following delisting and paper mill problems

Publishing giant Wiley has closed 19 journals, once again putting concerns around fake studies front and centre.

The journals that were withdrawn were all owned by Hindawi, a company Wiley bought in January 2021, that was later discovered to have a paper mill problem at some titles. Paper mills produce phony manuscripts for publication, whose authorship can then be sold.

‘Paper mills are illicit businesses that engage in a variety of questionable and irresponsible business practices from fabricating data, to fabricating papers and selling authorship,’ says Sarah Eaton, an expert on academic ethics at the University of Calgary, Canada. ‘They are focused on generating profit at scale and they do not care about science.’

Wiley stated that the removal of the titles was normal business practice and that the journals, which included the Journal of Nanomaterials, were pulled as they no longer served the needs of their communities.