In March, Wiley revealed to the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) a $US9 million ($13.5 million) plunge in research revenue after being forced to "pause" the publication of so-called "special issue" journals by its Hindawi imprint, which it had acquired in 2021 for US$298 million ($450 million).
Its statement noted the Hindawi program, which comprised some 250 journals, had been "suspended temporarily due to the presence in certain special issues of compromised articles". Many of these suspect papers purported to be serious medical studies, including examinations of drug resistance in newborns with pneumonia and the value of MRI scans in the diagnosis of early liver disease.
As the months ticked by, the number of papers being withdrawn mounted by the hundreds. By November, Wiley had retracted as many as 8,000 papers. The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Wiley has now pulled more than 11,300 papers and shuttered 19 journals. The Hindawi scandal offers a window into a thriving black market worth tens of millions of dollars which trades in fake science, corrupted research and bogus authorship. It also illustrates what is just another front in a much broader crisis of trust confronting universities and scientific institutions worldwide.
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