Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement

The Journal of Applied Informatics and Computing (JAIC) is committed to maintaining the highest standards of publication ethics, academic integrity, and responsible scholarly publishing. This statement defines the ethical responsibilities of authors, editors, reviewers, the editorial board, and the publisher, Politeknik Negeri Batam, Indonesia.

JAIC follows the principles of responsible scholarly publishing and draws on the guidance of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). All parties involved in the publication process are expected to uphold honesty, transparency, fairness, confidentiality, and accountability.

This statement covers publication ethics, research misconduct, conflicts of interest, complaints and appeals, and procedures for correcting or retracting published articles.

Section A: Publication and Authorship

All submitted manuscripts undergo an editorial assessment and, when considered suitable for peer review, are evaluated by at least two qualified reviewers with relevant expertise.
JAIC applies a double-anonymous peer-review process, provided the journal's review arrangements allow the identities of authors and reviewers to remain undisclosed to each other.
Manuscripts are assessed based on their relevance to the journal's focus and scope, originality, methodological soundness, significance, clarity, quality of presentation, and contribution to the field.
Editorial decisions may include acceptance, acceptance subject to revisions, a request for major revision or resubmission, or rejection, in accordance with the journal's peer-review policy.
An invitation to revise and resubmit a manuscript does not guarantee acceptance. Revised manuscripts may undergo further review before a final decision is made.
A rejected manuscript will not normally be reconsidered unless the Editor-in-Chief determines that there are exceptional circumstances or grounds for an appeal under the journal's procedures.
Acceptance and publication are subject to applicable legal requirements, copyright provisions, research ethics standards, and the journal's policies on plagiarism, originality, and publication misconduct.
Manuscripts must not be published previously or simultaneously submitted for publication elsewhere. Exceptions, such as legitimate preprints or other forms of prior dissemination, must comply with the journal's specific policy.
Authorship must accurately reflect substantial scholarly contributions. All listed authors must meet the journal's authorship criteria, approve the final manuscript, and accept accountability for their contributions.
Guest, gift, honorary, and ghost authorship are not permitted. Contributions that do not qualify for authorship should be acknowledged appropriately.
Authors must disclose relevant funding sources, conflicts of interest, and the use of generative AI tools in accordance with the journal's applicable policies.
Research involving human participants, personal data, identifiable information, or other activities requiring ethical approval or informed consent must comply with applicable ethical standards and legal requirements.

Section B: Authors' Responsibilities

Authors submitting manuscripts to JAIC are responsible for ensuring that their research and manuscripts comply with the following requirements:

Originality: Authors must ensure that their manuscripts are original and that all sources, ideas, data, figures, and other materials taken from external sources are appropriately cited or acknowledged.
Exclusive submission: Authors must confirm that their manuscripts are not under consideration by another journal at the same time and must disclose relevant prior publication or dissemination.
Research integrity: Authors must ensure that the data, results, analyses, and conclusions reported in their manuscripts are accurate and honestly presented.
Prohibition of misconduct: Fabrication, falsification, plagiarism, inappropriate image manipulation, data manipulation, and other forms of research or publication misconduct are prohibited.
Authorship and contributions: All listed authors must have made qualifying contributions, approved the final version, and agreed to take responsibility for the integrity of the work. Changes to authorship must be justified and approved by all affected authors in accordance with the journal's policy.
Peer-review cooperation: Authors must respond to reviewers' and editors' comments professionally and provide clear, evidence-based explanations when accepting or disagreeing with requested revisions.
Citation and acknowledgment: Authors must appropriately cite relevant prior work and acknowledge the contributions of individuals or organizations that do not meet the criteria for authorship.
Conflicts of interest: Authors must disclose financial, professional, personal, or other relationships that could reasonably be perceived to influence their research or its interpretation.
Funding disclosure: Authors must identify the sources of financial or material support for the research and disclose the role of the funder, where applicable.
Research ethics and informed consent: Authors must obtain relevant ethical approval, participant consent, and permission to publish identifiable information when required by applicable standards, institutional requirements, or law.
Generative AI use: Authors must disclose the use of generative AI tools in accordance with JAIC's Generative AI Policy. AI tools must not be listed as authors, and human authors remain responsible for the accuracy, originality, integrity, and final content of their manuscripts.
Corrections after publication: Authors must promptly notify the editorial office if they discover a material error or inaccuracy in their published article and cooperate with the journal in determining whether a correction, retraction, or other action is necessary.
Data availability and reproducibility: Authors should retain appropriate research records and provide supporting data, code, materials, or methodological details when reasonably requested and when permitted by ethical, legal, privacy, and confidentiality requirements.
Compliance with editorial policies: Authors must comply with JAIC's policies concerning authorship, plagiarism screening, copyright and licensing, peer review, research ethics, and publication integrity.

Section C: Reviewers' Responsibilities

Reviewers play an essential role in maintaining the quality and integrity of the journal. They are expected to:

Confidentiality: Treat submitted manuscripts, supplementary materials, and communications as confidential documents and not disclose or use unpublished information without appropriate authorization.
Objectivity and fairness: Evaluate manuscripts objectively and professionally, avoiding personal criticism, discriminatory comments, or unsupported judgments about the authors.
Constructive feedback: Provide clear, evidence-based, and constructive comments that help editors make informed decisions and assist authors in improving their work.
Timeliness: Complete reviews within the agreed timeframe or notify the editor promptly if additional time is needed or the review cannot be completed.
Relevant literature: Identify important relevant publications that have not been cited and provide sufficient information to help the authors verify the recommendations.
Originality and overlap: Inform the editor of suspected plagiarism, substantial overlap with published work, duplicate submission, or other potential publication ethics concerns.
Conflicts of interest: Decline to review manuscripts when personal, financial, professional, institutional, collaborative, or competitive relationships could compromise impartiality.
Appropriate use of technology: Protect manuscript confidentiality when using digital tools and comply with the journal's requirements concerning generative AI and external services.
No unauthorized use: Not appropriate the ideas, data, methods, or findings contained in a manuscript under review for personal research or professional advantage.
Editorial independence: Provide recommendations based on scholarly merit and ethical considerations rather than commercial, institutional, or personal interests.

Section D: Editors' Responsibilities

Editors are responsible for managing the editorial process fairly, independently, and transparently. Their responsibilities include:

Editorial authority: Make editorial decisions based on scholarly quality, originality, methodological rigor, relevance to the journal's scope, ethical compliance, and the available review evidence.
Editorial independence: Exercise editorial judgment independently and resist inappropriate influence from the publisher, authors, reviewers, institutions, advertisers, or other interested parties.
Fair treatment: Evaluate manuscripts without discrimination based on authors' nationality, institutional affiliation, gender, personal beliefs, or other characteristics unrelated to scholarly merit.
Peer-review management: Select appropriate reviewers, manage the review process, evaluate reviewer recommendations, and make decisions in accordance with the journal's peer-review policy.
Confidentiality: Protect the confidentiality of manuscripts and preserve reviewer anonymity under the journal's double-anonymous review process, except where disclosure is authorized or legally required.
Quality assurance: Ensure that published content meets the journal's academic, technical, ethical, and editorial standards.
Conflicts of interest: Identify and manage conflicts of interest involving editors, reviewers, authors, and editorial board members. Editors must recuse themselves when a conflict could compromise impartiality and arrange for an independent editor to handle the manuscript.
Research ethics: Assess ethical declarations and take appropriate action when there are credible concerns about research approval, informed consent, data integrity, plagiarism, authorship, or other forms of misconduct.
Funding transparency: Ensure that relevant funding information and declared conflicts of interest are addressed in accordance with journal policy.
Handling allegations: Investigate credible allegations of misconduct in a fair and timely manner, give relevant parties an appropriate opportunity to respond, and consult institutions or independent experts when necessary.
Corrections and retractions: Publish corrections, expressions of concern, or retraction notices when warranted to protect the accuracy and integrity of the scholarly record.
Consistency of decisions: Avoid reversing previous editorial decisions without a reasonable and documented basis. Decisions made by previous editors should be reconsidered only when justified by new evidence, procedural concerns, or other exceptional circumstances.
Appeals and complaints: Provide a fair process for handling complaints and appeals, preferably involving an editor who was not responsible for the original decision.
No unsupported accusations: Distinguish substantiated findings from suspicions. Editors must assess available evidence fairly and must not present unverified allegations as established misconduct.
Publication record: Maintain appropriate editorial records and ensure that material changes to published articles are documented transparently.

Section E: Publisher's Responsibilities

The publisher, Politeknik Negeri Batam, supports JAIC in maintaining ethical and responsible publishing practices. The publisher is expected to:

Support editorial independence and avoid inappropriate interference in manuscript evaluation and editorial decisions.
Provide reasonable administrative and technical support for the journal's editorial and publication activities.
Support the implementation of publication ethics policies and the fair investigation of credible allegations of misconduct.
Cooperate with the editorial team in addressing serious ethical concerns, corrections, retractions, and other actions needed to maintain the integrity of the scholarly record.
Support the preservation, accessibility, and accurate identification of published articles and associated correction or retraction notices.
Ensure that the journal's ownership, management, policies, and publication information are presented transparently.

Section F: Research Misconduct and Complaints

JAIC takes allegations of research and publication misconduct seriously. Potential violations include, but are not limited to, plagiarism, fabrication or falsification of data, duplicate publication, inappropriate authorship practices, undisclosed conflicts of interest, manipulation of peer review, and violations of research ethics.

When a concern is raised, the editorial team will:

Conduct an initial assessment to determine whether the allegation warrants further investigation.
Request relevant explanations, records, or supporting evidence from the parties concerned, as appropriate.
Consult independent experts, institutional authorities, research ethics committees, or other relevant organizations when necessary.
Assess the available evidence impartially and provide the parties concerned with an appropriate opportunity to respond.
Determine the appropriate action based on the seriousness of the concern and the evidence available.

Possible actions include requesting clarification or correction, rejecting a manuscript, suspending editorial processing, publishing a correction or retraction, issuing an expression of concern, or referring the matter to an appropriate institution.

JAIC will handle allegations as confidentially as reasonably possible during the investigation. Confidentiality does not prevent the journal from contacting relevant institutions or taking appropriate action to protect the integrity of the scholarly record.

Complaints about editorial conduct, peer review, or publication ethics should be submitted to the editorial office with a clear description of the concern and supporting evidence, where available. Complaints and appeals will be reviewed fairly and, where feasible, by an individual who was not directly involved in the matter being challenged.

Section G: Correction and Retraction Policy

JAIC is committed to maintaining an accurate and reliable scholarly record. When significant errors or ethical concerns are identified in a published article, the journal will assess the available evidence and take appropriate action. The action taken will depend on the nature, severity, and implications of the concern.

1. Corrections

A correction may be published when an error in a published article requires amendment or clarification but does not invalidate the overall reliability of the research.

Corrections may concern author names or affiliations, publication metadata, figures, tables, equations, references, factual statements, or other errors that can be corrected without undermining the article's main findings or conclusions.

Authors should notify the editorial office promptly when they identify an error in their published work. Readers and other parties may also report suspected errors.

The editorial team will assess the issue and may consult the authors, reviewers, or relevant experts. If a correction is warranted, JAIC will publish a correction notice that identifies the affected article, describes the error, and explains the correction. The notice will be linked to the original article, and relevant metadata will be updated where appropriate.

The original article will normally remain accessible to preserve the scholarly record.

2. Retractions

A retraction may be issued when the reliability or integrity of a published article is seriously compromised. A retraction is intended to alert readers that some or all of the article's findings or conclusions should no longer be relied upon.

Grounds for retraction may include:

Clear evidence that the findings are unreliable because of major errors, invalid data, or serious methodological problems.
Fabrication or falsification of data, images, results, or research procedures.
Plagiarism or substantial unattributed use of another person's work.
Duplicate or redundant publication that violates publication ethics.
Serious violations of research ethics, including unauthorized or unethical use of protected information.
Undisclosed manipulation of the publication or peer-review process.
Other substantiated forms of research or publication misconduct that materially undermine the article's integrity.

A retraction will not be issued solely because findings are disputed, interpretations differ, or subsequent research reaches different conclusions, provided the original work remains methodologically sound and ethically compliant.

3. Retraction Procedure

When credible concerns about a published article arise, the editorial team will assess the evidence and determine whether further investigation is necessary.

The process may include:

An initial assessment of the concern and available evidence.
Communication with the corresponding author and, where appropriate, other authors or relevant parties.
A request for explanations, supporting records, or additional information.
Consultation with independent experts, institutional authorities, or research ethics committees when necessary.
An editorial decision on whether to issue a correction, retraction, expression of concern, or no further action.

Authors will normally be given an opportunity to respond. However, the journal may proceed with an appropriate action when the evidence supports it, even if the authors do not respond or disagree with the decision.

4. Retraction Notices and Article Status

A retraction notice will identify the affected article, state that it has been retracted, explain the reason for the action in sufficient detail, and link to the original publication. The notice will identify the party initiating the retraction where appropriate.

The original article will generally remain accessible but will be clearly marked as "Retracted." The retraction notice will be linked prominently to the article. Removal of the article's content will be considered only when necessary for legal, privacy, safety, or other compelling reasons.

Where applicable, JAIC will update relevant metadata and notify indexing services or other publishing platforms of the retraction.

5. Expressions of Concern

When credible concerns exist but the available evidence is insufficient to reach a final decision, or an investigation is expected to take considerable time, JAIC may publish an expression of concern.

The notice will inform readers about the unresolved issue without prematurely concluding that misconduct has occurred. It may subsequently be updated, replaced by a correction, or followed by a retraction when further evidence becomes available.

6. Withdrawal Before Publication

Withdrawal applies to manuscripts that have not yet been formally published. Authors requesting withdrawal must submit a written request to the editorial office and provide a reason for the request.

The corresponding author must ensure that the request accurately reflects the position of the authors. The manuscript should not be submitted to another journal while it remains under active consideration by JAIC. Authors should obtain confirmation of withdrawal before submitting it elsewhere.

If serious ethical concerns are identified before publication, JAIC may discontinue the editorial process and take additional action in accordance with its publication ethics policies.

7. Appeals Concerning Corrections and Retractions

Authors who disagree with a correction or retraction decision may submit a reasoned appeal supported by relevant evidence. Where feasible, the appeal will be reviewed by an editor who was not directly involved in the original decision, and independent expert advice may be sought.

The journal will communicate the outcome to the relevant parties. An appeal does not automatically suspend or remove an already published correction or retraction notice.

Section H: Generative AI and Publication Ethics

JAIC recognizes that generative AI tools may be used in certain stages of research and manuscript preparation. Authors must disclose such use in accordance with the journal's Generative AI Policy.

AI tools cannot be listed as authors because they cannot assume responsibility or accountability for scholarly work. Authors remain fully responsible for the accuracy of the content, originality, citations, research integrity, and compliance with ethical and legal requirements.

Reviewers and editors must protect confidential manuscript information and must not upload unpublished manuscripts or confidential review materials to external AI tools where doing so would breach confidentiality, privacy, or journal policy.

Any suspected misuse of AI, including fabricated references, manipulated content, or undisclosed use that violates journal policy, will be assessed in accordance with the journal's procedures for research and publication misconduct.

Section I: Implementation and Review

This Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement applies to authors, reviewers, editors, editorial board members, and the publisher involved in JAIC's publishing activities.

The editorial team is responsible for implementing this policy and reviewing it periodically to maintain consistency with recognized publication ethics principles and developments in scholarly publishing.

For questions, complaints, or reports concerning publication ethics, research misconduct, corrections, or retractions, please contact the JAIC editorial office through the contact information provided on the journal's official website.