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Five ways to spot when a paper is a fraud - Nature

Science sleuths share their common-sense tips for sniffing out fishy articles.

ScienceBy Wire ServicesFebruary 25, 20261 min read

Last updated: April 3, 2026, 9:34 PM

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Five ways to spot when a paper is a fraud - Nature
  • TECHNOLOGY FEATURE
  • 25 February 2026

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From the low-quality output of paper mills to increasingly convincing content generated by artificial intelligence, peer reviewers are being inundated with questionable research manuscripts. A growing number of AI tools can detect fraudulent elements in papers, but they can be expensive to use. Such tools are probably better deployed by journal publishers rather than individual reviewers, says Elisabeth Bik, a science-integrity consultant in San Francisco, California, especially because feeding unpublished content into AI tools can compromise confidentiality and is generally frowned on during peer review.

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