Allegation of Research Misconduct
DEPLOY takes all allegations of research misconduct seriously, whether raised before or after publication, and handles them fairly, confidentially, and on the basis of evidence, following the COPE flowcharts.
1. Forms of Misconduct
Fabrication; falsification, including unjustified removal of outliers and image manipulation; plagiarism; duplicate or redundant publication; simultaneous submission; salami slicing; ghost, gift, or guest authorship; citation manipulation and coercive citation; breaches of research ethics such as missing ethical approval or informed consent; and undisclosed conflicts of interest.
2. How to Report
Send reports to deployjournal@gmail.com with the subject "Allegation of Misconduct - [Article ID/Title]", including the article details, a specific description of the concern, supporting evidence, and your contact details. Complainant identities are kept confidential. Anonymous reports are considered where the evidence is strong enough to investigate; reports without evidence are not pursued.
3. Procedure
- Acknowledgement: within 3 working days.
- Initial assessment by the Editor-in-Chief: 7-14 days.
- Request for written clarification from the corresponding author: 14-30 days. Authors are always given a right of reply.
- Investigation by an independent panel, contacting the authors' institution where necessary: 30-90 days.
- Written decision to complainant and authors, with reasons.
An Expression of Concern may be published while an investigation is ongoing.
4. Sanctions
Rejection before publication; publication of a Correction; Retraction with a permanent retraction notice; a [three]-year submission ban for all authors involved; notification of institutions, funders, and indexing services.
5. Principles
Presumption of innocence, confidentiality, proportionate sanctions, retention of case records for at least five years, and a single right of appeal within 30 days reviewed by parties not involved in the original decision.
