Frontiers has identified and retracted 122 articles across five of its journals after uncovering a coordinated network of authors and editors involved in peer review processes marked by undisclosed conflicts of interest and citation manipulation. The findings emerged from an investigation conducted by Frontiers’ Research Integrity Auditing team.
In addition to the retracted content within its own portfolio, the investigation revealed that the same network has been extensively active across the broader scholarly publishing landscape. More than 4,000 articles attributed to this group have appeared in journals from seven other publishers, prompting recommendations for further scrutiny beyond Frontiers’ platform. The publisher has indicated its readiness to share investigative methods and findings with other affected stakeholders upon request.
The inquiry was triggered by a concern submitted to the editorial office regarding a suspected conflict of interest in the peer review of a single article. Because Frontiers publicly discloses the names of reviewers for accepted papers, the issue was identifiable by a reader, prompting a broader audit. The Research Integrity Auditing team subsequently reviewed past submissions, publications, and co-authorship networks associated with the authors in question.
The findings pointed to a highly coordinated and complex pattern of activity involving approximately 35 authors operating across multiple journals and publishers. Although only a portion of the affected publications appeared in Frontiers journals, the scale and structure of the network raised concerns about wider implications for the integrity of the peer review process.
At the time the majority of the retracted papers were published in 2022, the publisher's Artificial Intelligence Review Assistant (AIRA)—first introduced in 2018—did not include functionality for verifying conflict of interest disclosures from reviewers and handling editors. This limitation has since been addressed with the release of an updated version of AIRA, which now includes over 50 distinct verification checks for submitted manuscripts.
The retraction process is currently underway and is expected to be completed by early August.
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