Open Access Investigates!: Exposing the shady world of predatory publishers

This breakout session was presented at the Together24 Library Staff Conference on Wednesday 12th June 2024.

Occasionally The Open Access Team receives a request for Open Access funding for a journal that we think might be a bit… suspect.

In this session we invite colleagues from across the library to don their deerstalker, and act as an Open Access Investigator, spotting the shady publishers and suspicious OA practices of predatory publishers.

We’ll cover what predatory publishing is, the ways we spot a problematic journal, and what behaviour and clues we look for to identify a non-reputable publisher. We’ll share our experiences of suspicious journals, and some of the Open Access publishing activity we encounter in the OA team that we consider dodgy.