Peer Review Fraud Like Cardboard
Legal precedent sets the groundwork
Disclaimer: This is not legal advice. Consult with a legal professional.
Update: Comment provided by Jessica Rose, PhD, has been added to the article.
Big thanks to Jikkyleaks for publishing the poll necessary to make this article happen (if you’re on Twitter, give them a follow). The Daily Beagle attempted to contact Elsevier, Wiley publishing, and Sci-Hub for comment, and a few others, and received no response.
Peer Review: The Big Fraud
The Daily Beagle reached out to Jikkyleaks as impartial third party to ask their followers if they anticipated peer review to include an underlying review of the raw data.
We asked, as a little known fact, public polls can set the groundwork for legal cases (including unfair competition).
Out of 368 votes, 87% said yes (and 94.3% if you include ‘mostly’); this was despite the poll being heavily suppressed by Twitter as it tried to bump The Daily Beagle out of viewing it (redirecting to the main homepage).
Some Twitter posters even expressed confusion at why this question even needed to be asked, being under the impression raw data is reviewed:
The reasonable person would expect peer review to include a review of the raw data, wouldn’t they? But surprise! Peer review doesn’t actually review the raw data. The poll is necessary for proving the public have been duped into this false belief.
Peer Review Does Not Peer Review Raw Data
As an opener, a quote from Academia Stack Exchange (a question and answer site dedicated to questions of Academia), one reviewer remarks they rarely ask for data, rarely get asked for data, and only challenge on methodology:
As another quipped on Twitter, if they’re not reviewing the data, then what are they reviewing?
Are governments and universities really paying overpriced subscription fees for some overglorified spellchecking (and not actual data review)?
Well, according to one study, the answer is yes, where ‘writing criteria’ (corrections to spelling, grammar, etc) were the most frequent ‘peer review’ comment, followed by remarks on methodology:
Even with this limitation in mind, the study still found reviewers were far more likely to act in the capacity of a spellchecker than review even the methodology (no comment on raw data, notice):
This included a reviewer who… admitted they didn’t know how to do a review!
In an editoral titled “No raw data, no science: another possible source of the reproducibility crisis”, Tsuyoshi Miyakawa — who has handled 180 manuscripts — and in 41 cases made a decision to ‘revise before review’ (read: ask for the raw data).
97% were unable to provide the raw data when challenged:
The breakdown of the 41 papers: 21 withdrew their paper without providing data, 19 had insufficient data (of which 9 had partial or no data; 7 didn’t match the data in the paper; 2 had image duplication). Out of the 18 that involved Western blots, 11 lacked size markers (reminder that the Pfizer Western Blots look fraudulent).
That is to say, 40 of the 41 papers had no evidence — raw data — to back up their claims.
It isn’t isolated. Another study, titled “Data sharing practices and data availability upon request differ across scientific disciplines”, found between 2000–2009 that data availability (including only incomplete, partial data) was a mere 54.2%, and between 2010–2019 it was 71.8%:
The use of “at least partial data availability” seriously dilutes this work, however, because it makes raw data seem more broadly available for review, when it’s incomplete and therefore not actually reviewable in the slightest.
Even with their particular terminology fudge, the percentages are absurdly low. 1/4th of all papers can’t produce any raw data at all. This is ignoring the fact the 2000-2009 discrepancy of almost half is worse (papers get cited and are used to make healthcare, political and government decisions).
Fraud In Peer Review Is Extensive
In 2005 — before they got bought out by Jeff Bezos — the Washington Post published the survey results from researchers regarding publication.
15% admitted to tampering with the design, results, or observations, including to appease a financial sponsor (think of all those ‘vaccine studies’ financed by pharmaceutical companies):
0.3% (which is still high given the endless tens of thousands of papers) admitted to faking research data, 4.7% duplicated data, and a whopping 13.5% designed their studies such they would not give accurate results:
In another case, one Japanese ‘researcher’, reportedly ‘Yoshihiro Sato’, had fabricated over 200 papers, 130 of which were with a collaborator called ‘Jun Iwamoto’.
Investigators could not understand how they had gotten away with fraud for so long:
Sato had been manufacturing content from Mitate Hospital for 20 or so years:
His work contaminated other papers, including changing the outcomes of research and being used to justify clinical funding (this will become extremely relevant later on):
Meanwhile, the journals didn’t want suspicion to fall on their shoddy ‘peer review’ practices and demanded the finger be pointed away:
If the data is ‘reviewed’, how do so many fraudulent works slip through the net?
‘Peer Review’ Is A Media Stunt
This particular point was highlighted by James Lindsay:
He points out how former media tycoon Robert Maxwell essentially founded the modern day concept of ‘peer review’ publishing.
The emphasis on making money out of so-called ‘knowledge’ is quite symbolic here.
If Robert Maxwell’s name sounds vaguely familiar, it should. He’s the father of convicted pedophile Ghislane Maxwell, associate child rapist to Jeffrey Epstein.
Robert Maxwell had changed his name at least four times, and performed prior work for British Intelligence.
It was through his British intelligence ties he was introduced to scientific publishing:
Daan Frank considered Maxwell dishonest for having a total disregard for content:
Essentially he appealed to scientists’ egos (‘trust the science’ can be heard echoing) and didn’t sell quality review, but prestige:
Even wandering onto Elsevier, one of the largest publishing sites, it prominently features a way for those who publish to ‘track their influence’. All whilst Elsevier puts up an empty blurb about “Confidence in Research”:
So, journals are nothing more than prestige peddlers pretending to peer review papers but approving fraudulent papers. Surely the pharmaceutical companies are better?
Pharmaceuticals Don’t Disclose Raw Data Either
An audit study dug into the policy positions of pharmaceutical companies regarding the publication of trial results. They investigated 50 companies in total; 25 of the highest earners, and 25 selected randomly from the lower ranks.
For those of you who still think they’re remotely trustworthy, the results will be shocking. Many had no timeline for disclosure of raw data, and only 6 (out of 50) would publish anything related to ‘unlicensed medicines’ [read: including emergency authorised shots] and ‘off-label uses’.
The audit found their policy documents included ‘problematic, inaccurate and contradictory language’ regarding disclosure:
For example, Lundbeck claims exclusions to transparency, despite claiming to follow the Declaration of Helsinki, which requires transparency:
Pfizer’s “loophole” is they won’t disclose the data unless basically compelled by law to do so (which given the corruption at health ‘regulators’, they’re never required to do so):
Journals Are Non-Committed To Peer Review
The Daily Beagle fired off a broad spectrum inquiry to various organisations to ask their views about peer review. Elsevier, Wiley Publishing and open access outsider Sci-Hub did not reply prior to publication.
We also asked some researchers their views on how they think peer review should work.
Update: Jessica Rose, PhD, who has a wide variety of academic experience, commented in regards to peer review:
"self-regulation by qualified members of a profession within the relevant field" problem is the self-regulation and the fact that the 'qualified members' are selected but not in a non-conflicted way.
Given researchers have modified study results in light of sponsors’ demands, the conflict-of-interest, as Jessica raises in relation to peer review, is a serious issue.
Martin Neil politely declined due to time constraints, however they pointed us to Denis Rancourt.
Denis Rancourt has previously worked as a professor of physics at the University of Ottawa and has published over 100 papers, so they have experience with peer review. They’re currently a writer at Brownstone Institute.
Denis in an email referred to an article with an interesting set of proposals regarding peer review (The Daily Beagle largely agrees). Most notably we draw focus to point 8 (emphasis added):
8. All author submissions must be accompanied with a guarantee of open access to the raw data, the equations and algorithms of computer programs, and anything required to reproduce the study and its results. Proprietary information is not a shield against this requirement. Science, by definition, must be verifiable.
Contrast this with the canned, meaningless statements by the ‘peer review’ journals.
Elsevier:
Encourage and support researchers to share research data where appropriate and at the earliest opportunity, for example, by enhancing our submission processes to make this easier […]
BMC:
BMC strongly encourages that all datasets on which the conclusions of the paper rely should be available to readers […]
Nature:
The journal strongly encourages that all datasets on which the conclusions of the paper rely should be available to readers.
Notice that craftily weak sauce wording? “Encourage”. Not require, but encourage.
They only encourage raw data be revealed. They don’t require it be revealed. Essentially, the journals are in the habit of publishing so-called ‘peer reviewed’ papers that they don’t even require have evidence to back up their claims! Utterly shambolic!
It is clear fraudsters are running circles around the loopholes, given numerous examples, both of fraud, and papers lacking raw data to back up their claims. Papers that impact healthcare services and government decision making. (Not that regulators review the data either.)
For this reason, we’re of the view journals are committing services fraud, by giving the false impression they’re offering something more advanced and more in-depth than a simple spellchecker in exchange for paid subscriptions and money.
Services Fraud
Under US Code, Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 63, Section 1341 - Frauds and swindles, it describes fraud as (butchered for brevity; as it is quite long):
Whoever, having devised [...] any scheme or artifice to defraud, or for obtaining money [...] by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises, or to sell [...] other article, or anything represented to be […] such counterfeit or spurious article, for the purpose of executing such scheme […], [...] deposits or causes to be deposited any matter or thing whatever to be sent or delivered by any private or commercial interstate carrier, [...] at the place at which it is directed to be delivered […], any such matter or thing, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.
Translation: anyone who creates something fraudulent and transmits it to another person ('interstate carrier' broadly interpreted to include internet service provider [ISP]) in exchange for money or sales, is guilty of fraud.
It was amended in 1988 to include Section 1346, which includes honest services fraud:
[…] deprive another of the intangible right of honest services
What Is Honest Services Fraud?
In 1997, the case of United States v. Frost involved researchers (Frost and Turner) who had engaged in plagiarism of dissertations (papers, basically) in order to acquire Federal grant money.
Frost and Turner tried to argue because they weren’t public servants, Section 1346 did not apply; the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit disagreed; engaging in falsified research papers in order to get money from governments amounts to honest services fraud. Meaning, any privately hosted paper that claims to be peer reviewed — but actually isn’t — is engaging in the same kind of fraud.
Conclusion
Put simply: peer reviewed papers, that are painted as being peer reviewed, but aren’t, and lack the raw data to substantiate their claims, hosted by ‘peer review’ journals and sold under the pretense of being ‘peer reviewed’, in exchange for money, either from subscriptions or grants, amounts to fraud on journals’ behalf. Prosecutable fraud.Will anyone champion this in a court of law? We will see.
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And leave your thoughts in the comments below:
to a layman, the term “peer reviewed” creates the impression that the results have been verified by experts as reproducible … otherwise it’s just salesmanship
Nice work!
I like your report a lot.