Scholarly Communication: Predatory Publishers

Make the right assessment:

• Think. Check. Submit. the website provides further information and helps researchers identify trusted journals for their research.
• Think. Check. Attend. the website helps researchers to judge the legitimacy and academic credentials of conferences to attend.
• Publish with only those journals on the current ERA Journal List.
• COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) - global committee providing leadership and resources on publication ethics.
• DOAJ (Directory of Open Access Journals) - searchable directory of high quality, peer-reviewed, OA journals. 
• Beall's List of Potential Predatory Journals and Publishers

It doesn't matter if you have been contacted directly by a publisher, or if you have sought them yourself. The same level of scrutiny should be applied. For example:

• Does the content of my work fit the scope of this publication?
• Is it indexed and abstracted widely  to be easily discoverable?
• Is it peer-reviewed?
• Are you aware of other colleagues who have published there?
• Are publisher terms and conditions clearly stated on their website? if so, do the terms and conditions suit?

If you notice publishers engaging in any of the following behaviors they could be predatory:

• Charging exorbitant rates for publication of articles in conjunction with a lack of peer review or editorial oversight.
• Notifying authors of fees only after acceptance
• Targeting scholars through mass-email spamming in attempts to get them to publish or serve on editorial boards
• Quick acceptance of low-quality papers, including hoax papers
• Listing scholars as members of editorial boards without their permission
• Listing fake scholars as members of editorial boards
• Copying the visual design and language of marketing materials and websites of legitimate, established journals.
• Fraudulent or improper use of ISSNs
• Giving false information about the location of the publisher.
• Fake, non-existent, or mis-represented impact factors

SOURCE: Predatory journals