Certification Policies

Reviewer Credits’ certification policies focus on two areas: protecting personal data and certifying peer reviews. These policies follow GDPR regulations to safeguard information and respect individual rights. Our peer review certification guidelines promote transparency and ethical standards within the scientific community. Together, these policies reflect our dedication to supporting researchers, editors, and publishers in strengthening trust in academic publishing.

Personal Data Protection Policy

We handle your personal data in line with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) 2018. When we ask for your information, it’s entirely voluntary, specific, informed, and clear. You have the right to access, correct, delete, or limit the use of your data, and to receive it in a portable format if applicable. You also have the right to avoid automated decisions affecting you. For more details on how we manage your data, please read our Privacy Policy.

At any time, you can request that we export or erase your personal data, from this page: https://www.reviewercredits.com/account/privacy

Peer Review Data Certification Policy

Reviewer Credits recognizes and certifies that a peer review has been performed by a specific individual for a specific journal. However, we do not evaluate or endorse the editorial or ethical policies of journals.

When peer review data is manually entered into our system—whether by a Peer Reviewer or a Journal (e.g., through CSV upload)—we register the claimed peer reviews automatically and make them available on user dashboards.

We also offer APIs for the automated transfer of peer review data from journal manuscript platforms to our database. These APIs are compatible with platforms such as Editorial Manager, OJS – Open Journal Systems, and ARPHA by Pensoft. From these platforms, we gather the necessary data to disambiguate records and prevent duplicate entries from multiple sources.

Other third parties (e.g., ORCID) do not provide the data required for disambiguation (e.g., Manuscript ID and the exact date of peer review completion). As a result, we may not always distinguish these records from those submitted through other channels.

To address this, we follow a policy to minimize duplication: for the same journal, we only import peer review records from third parties (e.g., ORCID) if they have a different year of completion. Similarly, we do not transfer peer review records to third parties (e.g., ORCID) if there is already a record for the same journal and year of completion.

This means that the presence of even one peer review record in our database can block the import of additional records from the same journal and year. We are actively working on a model to improve the disambiguation of imported peer review data.
Additionally, when a Journal ISSN provided by third parties does not match our records, the Journal Title may be replaced with the ISSN in the Reviewer profile.

image of Unicode Character 'WARNING SIGN' (U+26A0)Peer reviews imported from ORCID will be indexed and included in Reviewer Certificates and Journal Certificates. However, these records will not assign credits to Peer Reviewers. Metadata of peer reviews imported from ORCID cannot be modified.

Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers
We are deeply committed to maintaining the highest ethical standards, contributing to a trustworthy publishing environment.

As an associate corporate member of COPE, we fully support their codes of conduct for the ethical behavior of authors, reviewers, editors, journals, publishers, and editorial board members. We expect all reviewers and journals registered with our services to adhere to the ethical recommendations provided by COPE.

Becoming a peer reviewer means joining a community of experts dedicated to assessing each other’s work. Peer review is a demanding process that requires skill, expertise, and time. While it comes with significant responsibilities, it also offers valuable opportunities to gain early insight into new ideas and research before they are published in Scientific Journals. Although it may not provide immediate rewards, Peer Reviewers play a crucial role in fostering fairness and integrity in scientific research, making their contributions invaluable.

COPE has developed Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers, and we strongly encourage our registered peer reviewers to follow these guidelines to maintain the highest ethical standards in their reviews. Key recommendations include:

  • Personally perform reviews only if you are knowledgeable on the subject, free from conflicts of interest, and able to dedicate the necessary time. Do not involve junior colleagues without prior permission from the Editor.
  • Notify the editors if you are working on similar topics or are affiliated with the same institution as the authors.
  • Conduct reviews confidentially, providing fair, respectful, and constructive feedback within the allocated time frame.
  • Report any potential ethical concerns to the editor confidentially.
Ethical Guidelines for Journals and Publishers

One of our aims is to certify the peer review process for all registered journals or for journals when a registered peer reviewer has claimed a review, by automatically verifying peer reviewers’ identities and claimed peer reviews.

As a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), we recommend that publishers, journals, and editors adopt COPE’s Core Practices, which give guidance on implementing an ethical approach to scientific publication. We require our registered journals and publishers to follow ethical publication practices, with specific attention to the following points:

  • The peer review model and process must be clearly identified on the journal website in a dedicated peer review policy, including a triage process that may result in submissions being rejected without peer review.
  • Peer reviewers are required to disclose conflicts of interest when invited to review an article.
  • Reviewers must be provided with clear guidance on their role and responsibilities, including how to report potential ethical misconduct.
  • Peer review guidelines should include information about deadlines for completing reviews.

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