- CaseCase Closed
Suspected plagiarism
…the percentage similarity that should raise concerns? This varies widely—by discipline, even by editors within the same discipline. The similarity index needs to be reviewed carefully, and experienced editors will look at all aspects of the article and the sources when deciding if there is significant overlap. Is there a minimum cut-off score below which there is no need to check for plagiarism? One… - Case
Possible plagiarism
A Middle Eastern author submitted four papers on different subjects at around the same time (two single author, two with other authors). During in-house assessment, it was noted that two of the papers were very similar to previously published papers. Fuller inspection of the complete papers indicated unequivocally that plagiarism had taken place—in one of the papers even the figures have been… - Case
Potential case of plagiarism
One of the referees of our journal has brought to our attention a potential case of plagiarism. The referee feels that the a manuscript submitted to our journal, representing a retrospective study of a cohort of patients with a particular condition, plagiarises an article published in another journal in 2003. The authors are from an institute in a middle-eastern country. The… - Case
Plagiarism in a review article
…the alleged plagiarism. The identity of the peer reviewer was not revealed, but the editors assumed that the authors would have known as s/he was the sole author of the teaching syllabus. The authors were very apologetic: They confessed that they had used the teaching syllabus in part because English is not their first language and that this was an innocent error. They claimed that they did not… - CaseCase Closed
Plagiarism of reviewer's work
…that the first author was contrite, and they advised the reviewer to tell the journal what had happened and seek our advice;4) this reviewer also supplied a helpful, constructive and positive review of the article (as, meanwhile, did another reviewer and subsequently did a third, as we felt unable to use the first reviewer’s review).We replied saying we took plagiarism very seriously and… - CaseOn-going
Plagiarism in a book title
We received a complaint of plagiarism by Dr A concerning a book that has just been published. This case is ongoing since January 2012. Authors B and C published a new, very extended edition (+1000 pages), on a topic that previously was covered in part in an English book by author B (published in 2006). Part of this book was based on a German book published back in 1993 by Dr A and… - Case
Suspected plagiarism
We had a case of suspected plagiarism recently on one of our journals, on which I would appreciate COPE’s advice. The case has been resolved, so this is not in the least urgent, but I would be interested to hear your views. Very briefly, at review stage the editor spotted substantial similarities between a paper submitted to our journal and a review published recently in a related… - Case
Attempted plagiarism of a published report
A review paper covering the prevention of a certain type of infection was submitted to Journal A. One of the reviewers identified that the paper was based word for word on a report that had published guidelines on the same area. The authors of both pieces are different. The only significant differences between the submission and the original paper were in the introduction and conclusion. The ed… - CaseCase Closed
Serial plagiarism by an experienced author
…about the paper that had already been published. The editor of the journal in which two of the key sources had been published kindly provided copies and the published paper was checked by hand against these two earlier papers. This check established that the iThenticate report was reasonably accurate. It appeared that one of the plagiarized papers had been used as a means to improve the quality… - CaseCase Closed
Plagiarism of a PhD thesis
We received a complaint from an author claiming that her PhD thesis had been plagiarized in a journal article. After many discussions, the editorial office decided that the authors should resolve this issue among themselves, as it was an author dispute.After further correspondence, the editorial office is now also saying that because the thesis is not published anywhere, there is no need… - CaseCase Closed
Is it plagiarism to use text verbatim from a manuscript review?
A commentary was reviewed by journal A and rejected. The paper was then submitted and accepted at journal B. Journal B published the commentary. After publication, a reviewer from journal A wrote to journal B with a complaint of plagiarism. Text from his/her review was used in the commentary published in journal B Question(s) for the COPE Forum• How should the editor of… - Case
A severe case of plagiarism?
…submitted manuscript with the publications provided by the reviewer and concluded that the submission presents a severe case of plagiarism with multiple copy-and-paste examples throughout the entire manuscript. The editor contacted the corresponding author by email and requested an explanation within a week. The corresponding author replied within the deadline but the editor did not find the… - Case
Plagiarism in a case report
…either an expression of concern about plagiarism or a letter of apology from the author. The Forum suggested finding out if one or both of the authors were involved in the plagiarism. The Forum noted that it is important that the published paper, if genuine, is linked to some form of formal correction, which could be either an expression of concern of a letter of apology.… - Case
Self plagiarism
…Examination of four or five easily accessible references revealed an unacceptably high proportion of direct replication: many phrases and sentences and some complete paragraphs. The paper was rejected with an explanation that this practice of self-plagiarism is unacceptable, and that the journal would be contacting the head of research ethics at the author’s institution. The author appealed against… - Case
Plagiarism and possible fraud
The authors of a paper published in another journal wrote to the editor of Journal A, complaining of apparent blatant plagiarism of their work by N et al. , whose paper had been published in the journal earlier in the year. Further investigation revealed that the text of the two papers was almost identical. S et al. had used one drug and N et al. had used a different one of the same class. The… - Case
Plagiarism of published paper
The advice from the Forum was to follow the flowchart on ‘Suspected plagiarism in a published article’. In the first instance, the editor should contact the corresponding author and ask for an explanation. If there is no response the editor should try to contact all of the other authors. If the response is unsatisfactory, the editor should consider informing the author’s institution and asking… - Case
A case of plagiarism
The general view was that the three year ban was harsh and perhaps not appropriate. Most members agreed that banning an author is not good policy and could lead to legal problems. Also, in dealing with cases from outside Europe and North America, we should bear in mind that plagiarism may be unintentional as authors may be less familiar with publication procedures. Hence there is a case here… - Case
Plagiarism case
…data sets from other countries. The “original” data set had indeed been plagiarised. In addition, the description of the methods was verbatim from the 2005 article, except for the instrument used in all three articles. As a result, there appeared to be clear plagiarism, illegitimate use of data and duplication of data. None of the 2006 articles cited each other and the initial 2005 article was cited… - CaseOn-going
Self-plagiarism of review article
…journal Y and this is only in reference to permission to reproduce an image. No other citation or reference is given to the paper in journal X. The editor-in-chief of journal Y followed our standard procedures and wrote to the corresponding author seeking an explanation. They responded promptly and indicated that they “object (to) the use of the term plagiarism in this context”. Although the… - CaseCase Closed
Claim of plagiarism in published article
…practice). Author A sent me the articles for comparison and stated that she thought this was plagiarism and that, furthermore, her student had no experience caring for these patients so she had misrepresented herself as an authority on this topic. The student (author B) was the first author, the second author was a physician who was well published on this topic, and "writing assistance" had been…