Latest news with #datamanipulation
The Independent
4 days ago
- Science
- The Independent
Study finds organised scientific fraud is now a booming industry
An organised underground network of individuals and groups is enabling fraudulent research and increasingly undermining the integrity of science, an alarming new study warns. Researchers from Northwestern University in the US conducted a large-scale data analysis of scientific literature and found that sophisticated global networks were systematically undermining the integrity of academic publishing. The study, published in the journal PNAS, says the publication of fraudulent research is outpacing the growth of legitimate scientific works. Researchers say the findings should be a wake-up call for the scientific community to act before the public loses confidence in the scientific process. "This study is probably the most depressing project I've been involved with in my entire life," Luís AN Amaral, a complex social systems researcher from Northwestern University and one of the study's authors, said. "Science must police itself better in order to preserve its integrity.' Scientific fraud typically involves fraudulent research practices such as falsification of data or plagiarism that may lead to retracted papers. These practices were generally believed to be isolated actions of individuals taking shortcuts to get ahead in an increasingly competitive field. But the latest study uncovered an underground network operating in the shadows 'to fake the process of science'. "Millions of dollars are involved in these processes,' Dr Amaral said. In the study, researchers analysed datasets of retracted publications, editorial records and instances of image duplication from major aggregators of scientific literature like Elsevier's Scopus and the National Library of Medicine's PubMed. They also combed through data from scholarly journals removed from databases for failing to meet quality or ethical standards and from articles highlighted by the popular science integrity blog Retraction Watch. They found a network of "paper mills", brokers and infiltrated journals that churned out large numbers of manuscripts and sold them to academics seeking to quickly publish new work. The manuscripts were usually of low quality, featuring fabricated data, manipulated or even stolen images, and plagiarised content. "Not only can they buy papers, but they can buy citations. Then, they can appear like well-reputed scientists when they have barely conducted their own research at all,' Dr Amaral said. Researchers said they had only now started to scratch the surface of this network. "Paper mills operate by a variety of different models," Reese Richardson, another author of the study, said. 'They often sell authorship slots for hundreds or even thousands of dollars. A person might pay more money for the first author position or less money for a fourth author position.' Academicians appear to push fraudulent research for publication using a number of strategies. In some cases, groups of researchers collude to publish papers in multiple journals. When their fraudulent activities are discovered, they quickly retract the papers. Some people pay to have their papers accepted for publication in journals through a 'sham peer-review process'. The latest research also underlines the role of brokers who enable mass publication of fraudulent papers in compromised journals. "Brokers connect all the different people behind the scenes," Dr Amaral explained. 'You need to find someone to write the paper. 'You need to find people willing to pay to be the authors. You need to find a journal where you can get it all published. And you need editors in that journal who will accept that paper.' These underground organisations sometimes go around established journals and instead look for defunct journals to hijack. When a legitimate journal stops publishing, some bad actors take over its name or website and surreptitiously assume its identity. "This happened to the journal HIV Nursing. It was formerly the journal of a professional nursing organisation in the UK, then it stopped publishing, and its online domain lapsed,' Dr Richardson said. 'An organisation bought the domain name and started publishing thousands of papers on subjects completely unrelated to nursing.' Researchers call for a multipronged approach to combat this network that undermines the integrity of science. They emphasise the need for enhanced scrutiny of editorial processes, improved methods for detecting fabricated research, and a radical restructuring of the system of incentives in science. Scientists also call for further research to understand the networks facilitating this misconduct. "If we're not prepared to deal with the fraud that's already occurring, then we're certainly not prepared to deal with what generative AI can do to scientific literature," Dr Richardson said. "We have no clue what's going to end up in the literature, what's going to be regarded as scientific fact and what's going to be used to train future AI models, which then will be used to write more papers.'
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Bridgewater founder Ray Dalio urges Trump to reveal why he fired top labor official
(Reuters) -Investor Ray Dalio said on Monday he, too, would likely have fired the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics because he "believes the data is not good", but urged U.S. President Donald Trump to disclose the reasoning behind her removal. In a post on social media platform X, Dalio - founder of hedge fund Bridgewater Associates - said leaders "manipulating numbers" to suit their political objectives could be a big problem, echoing growing concern around the quality of economic data. Trump fired Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner Erika McEntarfer last week, accusing her of rigging the jobs figures, but did not provide evidence of the alleged manipulation. "It would be good if President Trump made his thinking clear," Dalio said. Critics have warned Trump's move could erode trust in official U.S. economic data, with chief U.S. economist Michael Feroli saying the risks of politicizing the data collection process should not be overlooked. Trump said on Sunday he would announce a new BLS commissioner within three or four days. Dalio said the method of calculating estimates for employment numbers was "obsolete and error-prone" and called for big changes to the way government assesses what is going on with the economy. "The huge revisions in Friday's employment numbers are symptomatic of this, especially because the revisions brought the numbers toward private estimates that were in fact much better," he said in his post. Dalio handed over control of Bridgewater to a new generation of investors in 2022 and has sold his remaining stake in the firm. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Reuters
5 days ago
- Business
- Reuters
Bridgewater founder Ray Dalio urges Trump to reveal why he fired top labor official
Aug 4 (Reuters) - Investor Ray Dalio said on Monday he, too, would likely have fired the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics because he "believes the data is not good", but urged U.S. President Donald Trump to disclose the reasoning behind her removal. In a post on social media platform X, Dalio - founder of hedge fund Bridgewater Associates - said leaders "manipulating numbers" to suit their political objectives could be a big problem, echoing growing concern around the quality of economic data. Trump fired Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner Erika McEntarfer last week, accusing her of rigging the jobs figures, but did not provide evidence of the alleged manipulation. "It would be good if President Trump made his thinking clear," Dalio said. Critics have warned Trump's move could erode trust in official U.S. economic data, with chief U.S. economist Michael Feroli saying the risks of politicizing the data collection process should not be overlooked. Trump said on Sunday he would announce a new BLS commissioner within three or four days. Dalio said the method of calculating estimates for employment numbers was "obsolete and error-prone" and called for big changes to the way government assesses what is going on with the economy. "The huge revisions in Friday's employment numbers are symptomatic of this, especially because the revisions brought the numbers toward private estimates that were in fact much better," he said in his post. Dalio handed over control of Bridgewater to a new generation of investors in 2022 and has sold his remaining stake in the firm.
Fox News
02-08-2025
- Business
- Fox News
Trump fires head of Bureau of Labor Statistics after jobs report revision
Counselor to the Treasury Secretary Joe Lavorgna joins 'Fox & Friends' to discuss President Trump firing the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics over a weak July jobs report and concerns the data was manipulated for political purposes.
CBS News
27-07-2025
- Business
- CBS News
Colorado officials say contractors falsified data at over 400 oil and gas sites
Several oil and gas companies operating in Colorado have been ordered to take corrective actions after third-party contractors reportedly falsified data on over 400 sites in Weld County. The Energy and Carbon Management Commission (ECMC) announced that two environmental consultants hired by oil and gas operators, Eagle Environmental Consulting, INC. and Tasman Geosciences, submitted falsified laboratory data reports. They say the data manipulation affected soil, groundwater, and inorganic and organic contaminant data for 404 oil and gas locations in Weld County. Civitas hired one of the environmental consultants in question. A neighborhood environmental group in Colorado, Save the Aurora Reservoir (S.T.A.R.), has been trying to stop the construction of a Civitas oil and gas project near the Aurora Reservoir for five years. Now, thanks to a State of Colorado investigation, they think they may have the evidence they need to do it. "It is frustrating. It's interesting, that's part of why we're here is to raise awareness," said Randy Willard, a Community Director with S.T.A.R., who spent part of his Saturday morning setting up their booth at the Arapahoe County Fair. They are trying to raise awareness about the upcoming approval hearing for the Sunlight-Long well, which will be the drilling site closest to the Aurora Reservoir. "It actually will sit up on the hills, will be nicely visible when you're at the beach," said Willard. Civitas has said repeatedly that it will protect the environment, having previously stated that they have worked hard to protect the environment and minimize impacts to communities. In a past statement, they told CBS Colorado: "We're especially proud of our design and utilization of the latest technologies to achieve and even exceed the state's and Arapahoe County's regulations, which remain among the strictest in the country." But Willard and S.T.A.R. disagree. "There's just a lot of things that are indicating to us that this industry is not operating as above board," said Willard. Now, with the ECMC issuing a Notice of Alleged Violation to seven operators, including Civitas, Willard says he will push harder to keep their project out of his neighborhood. Especially at the upcoming ECMC meeting that will discuss approval of the Sunlight-Long well. "We're very concerned about that, and we're bringing it up to all the authorities that we can," said Willard. CBS Colorado reached out to Eagle Environmental Consulting, INC. and Tasman Geosciences, but have not received a response as of the publishing of this article. We also reached out to all three operators who hired those contractors about the notice of alleged violations. Although CBS Colorado has not received a response from Civitas, two other operators sent statements to CBS Colorado. A Spokesperson for Oxy said: "We've received the notice, are currently reviewing the details, and will be responding directly to the ECMC. In late 2024, we were informed by a third-party environmental consultant that one of its employees, without our knowledge, had altered data related to some of our DJ Basin sites. We promptly reported the issue to the ECMC and immediately began working with regulators to remedy the issue. We were extremely disappointed to learn that an Oxy contractor submitted regulatory filings on Oxy's behalf that contained inaccurate, falsified data. We are committed to ensuring that everything submitted on behalf of Oxy is accurate." A spokesperson for Chevron said: "We received the Notice of Alleged Violation and we are currently reviewing. When Chevron became aware of this fraud, it promptly launched an investigation into these incidents and disclosed a list of the potentially impacted sites to the Colorado Energy and Carbon Management Commission (ECMC). We continue to cooperate fully and work closely with ECMC. Since learning of this falsified data, Chevron hired additional personnel to help review and assess all remediation contractor reports and increased its audits of laboratory reports and third-party consultants. Chevron is shocked that any third-party contractor would intentionally falsify data and file it with state officials to assess environmental corrective actions taken by Chevron. We remain committed to conducting business in full compliance with the laws and regulations in Colorado, as well as in all other jurisdictions in which we do business. Operating responsibly and ethically is a core value at Chevron and we expect the same from our contractors."
