Hijacked journals are a form of cybercrime in which a malicious third party creates a cloned website to impersonate a legitimate publication. The forgery replicates the original journal’s important details, from its title to its archive and international standard serial number, a code that identifies the publication. The purpose of a hijacking is to generate money quickly by charging illegitimate article-processing fees to unsuspecting researchers. Although the hijackers often publish papers that have been submitted to the fraudulent site, these works are not peer-reviewed nor considered legitimate.

Maybe if the real journals didn’t charge researchers an arm and a leg to have their paper published behind an equally absurd paywall to be able to read (often heavily publicly funded) research they wouldn’t be so ripe for abuse.

🪝🪝.com

Criminals mad that someone else stole their grift.