Seeing No Red Flags: Why Do Authors Ignore Journal Titles?

Publication scams have plagued academia for decades, with fraudulent journals impersonating legitimate ones to deceive authors. Compounding the issue are journal policy changes driven by editorial misjudgment or the acquisition of journals by profit-oriented publishers, leading to their removal from the Scopus database. This article focuses on the troubling trend of academic publications with an apparent mismatch between article content and specialized journal titles. Despite these discrepancies, the alarming number of publications in both discontinued and hijacked journals continues to rise. It is logical to explore whether authors who ignore titles and scopes may not be mere victims of these scams but also, potentially, in some cases, willing participants seeking to exploit the system.