Publication Ethics and Malpractice Policy

General ethical requirements for preparing, evaluating and publishing scientific materials in Technosphere Safety, the responsibilities of participants, and principles for responding to potential misconduct.

Contents

1. Purpose and scope
2. Core principles
3. Responsibilities of participants
4. Independence in conflicts of interest
5. Unacceptable practices
6. Confidentiality and digital tools
7. Reporting potential misconduct
8. Fair investigation and protection of the scholarly record
9. Related policies and implementation

01. Purpose and scope

This policy establishes the ethical framework for the scientific journal Technosphere Safety (E-ISSN 2181-3981). It applies to authors, editors, editorial board members, reviewers and publisher staff, as well as submitted manuscripts, accompanying materials and published works, including special-issue content where such issues are organised.

The journal's founder is the Tashkent Institute of Irrigation and Agricultural Mechanization Engineers National Research University (TIIAME NRU), and its publisher is I-EDU GROUP LLC. They provide organisational and technical support while safeguarding the independence of scientific assessment and decisions on individual manuscripts.

The policy covers research in industrial and occupational safety, fire and environmental safety, emergency prevention, technical system safety and technological risk assessment. In resolving ethical matters, the editorial office refers to applicable guidance from the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), including its Core Practices, and the transparency principles of COPE, DOAJ, OASPA and WAME. Reference to these standards does not imply membership in these organisations.

02. Core principles

• Research integrity. Methods, observations, measurements of hazardous occupational factors, calculations and conclusions must be reported accurately, acknowledging research limitations and the contributions of others.
• Impartial assessment. Scientific validity, significance, relevance to the journal's scope and ethical acceptability determine editorial decisions. Citizenship, gender, origin, beliefs, position or affiliation with the founder or publisher confer no advantage and must not lead to discrimination. Negative or statistically non-significant findings are not, in themselves, grounds for rejection.
• Accountability and transparency. Participants disclose relevant interests and sources of support, respond to substantiated questions and cooperate in correcting the scholarly record.
• Confidentiality and respect. Unpublished materials are protected against improper use; communication must be professional and free from threats, humiliation and pressure.
• No guarantee of acceptance. Payment, fee waivers, financial support, publication schedules or administrative instructions do not replace scientific assessment or justify lower ethical standards.

Inclusive and respectful scientific language. Authors must use accurate and respectful language, avoiding stereotypes, discriminatory statements and demeaning expressions. Personal or group characteristics should be reported only when scientifically relevant. This requirement does not restrict justified scientific criticism or objective presentation of results.

03. Responsibilities of participants

Authors

Authors are responsible for the reliability of their work, appropriate attribution of sources and lawful use of data, images, engineering diagrams, software code and other materials. All co-authors must be aware of submission, approve the final manuscript and accept their responsibilities. Contributions must be reported accurately; manuscript-preparation services do not justify concealing actual authors or selling authorship.

At submission, authors must disclose related previous work, financial and non-financial interests, funding and other material support, including the roles of supporting organisations. The absence of funding or conflicts of interest must also be declared. Authors provide data availability information and cooperate with reasonable verification requests, subject to lawful and ethical access restrictions, including protection of information about hazardous industrial facilities.

Where the nature of the research requires ethics approval, permits or informed consent, authors must obtain and report them; an applicable exemption from ethics review must be justified and documented. Upon discovering a significant error, authors must promptly notify the editorial office and cooperate in its investigation, including after publication.

Editors and the editorial board

Editors ensure substantive assessment of manuscripts, independent double-anonymous peer review involving at least two qualified reviewers, management of conflicts of interest and reasoned decisions. They must not exploit unpublished information, impose unjustified citations or disregard substantiated reports of errors. The authorised editor, not a reviewer, administrative employee or automated system, is responsible for the decision. The journal retains editorial oversight when guest editors are involved.

Reviewers

Reviewers accept assignments within their expertise, disclose interests that may affect their assessments and meet agreed deadlines or report delays. Comments must be reasoned and professional. Suspected misconduct must be reported to the editor rather than through independent public accusations, and peer review must not be used to promote the reviewer's publications. Delegation of an assignment requires prior editorial permission and adherence to confidentiality.

Founder and publisher

TIIAME NRU and I-EDU GROUP LLC support the editorial office, ethical procedures and independent handling of disputed cases. Financial and administrative operations are separated from article acceptance decisions. Remuneration of editors and staff must not depend on the number of accepted articles. The founder and publisher must not require publication of particular manuscripts or obstruct justified corrections for reputational or financial reasons.

04. Independence in conflicts of interest

Authors disclose interests relevant to their work at submission; editors and reviewers do so before assessment begins. Significant interests discovered later must be reported without delay. Disclosure of an interest does not itself establish misconduct; its nature, potential influence and necessary management measures are assessed.

An editor who is an author of a manuscript or has a substantial conflict of interest must withdraw from its handling. Such an editor must not select reviewers, participate in discussions or decisions, or access confidential review materials in an editorial capacity. As an author, the editor receives only information available to an ordinary author under the applicable peer-review model.

The manuscript is assigned to a qualified editor without the relevant conflict. Holding the position of Deputy Editor-in-Chief does not itself establish independence. Where institutional hierarchy, collaboration or the interests of the founder or publisher may compromise independence, an editor from another institution is appointed. The same principle applies to allegations concerning the Editor-in-Chief, board members or publisher; conflicted individuals must not investigate complaints about their own actions.

05. Unacceptable practices

The journal prohibits practices that misrepresent authorship, provenance, reliability or independent evaluation of scientific work. Such practices include:

• Fabrication and falsification: invented observations, hazardous exposure measurements, test results or sources; data substitution; unjustified removal of results; manipulation of images, graphs, risk maps or calculations that creates a misleading account of the research.
• Plagiarism and undisclosed reuse: appropriation of another person's text, ideas, data, engineering solutions, translations or code; presenting substantial portions of one's own published work as new without disclosure and citation.
• Duplicate publication: simultaneous consideration of identical or substantially overlapping manuscripts by multiple journals; undisclosed republication, including translation; artificial fragmentation of results accompanied by misleading claims of novelty.
• Authorship and identity manipulation: buying or selling authorship positions, fictitious or concealed authorship, falsified affiliations, consents or documents, and use of paper-mill services.
• Peer-review and citation manipulation: fictitious reviewers, fabricated reviews, coordinated attempts to bypass independent assessment, pressure on editors and demands for irrelevant citations to increase metrics.
• Concealment of material circumstances: intentional failure to disclose interests, funding, mandatory approvals or AI use where disclosure is required by journal policy; violations of research participant rights, confidentiality or justified safety requirements.

The existence of a disclosed preprint, dissertation or conference abstract does not itself establish misconduct. Authors must disclose such materials and overlap; eligibility is assessed under originality and repository policies. Honest error, justified scientific disagreement or failure to confirm a hypothesis is not automatically misconduct, although significant errors may require correction or retraction.

06. Confidentiality and digital tools

Access to manuscripts, peer reviews, personal data and correspondence is restricted to persons who need it for editorial work or appropriate investigation of an ethical concern. Materials must not be disclosed to outsiders or used for personal, academic or commercial advantage. Information about vulnerabilities of hazardous industrial facilities and critical infrastructure requires particular protection.

Editors and reviewers are prohibited from uploading confidential manuscripts, excerpts, reviews or unpublished data to external generative AI services, including services described as private. Editorial approval does not override this prohibition. AI tools cannot be authors, reviewers or bearers of editorial responsibility. A text-similarity score or AI-detector result alone does not prove misconduct; substantive human assessment is required.

07. Reporting potential misconduct

Authors, reviewers, readers and institutional representatives may report potential misconduct before or after publication. Reports should identify the work by title, DOI, URL or manuscript number, describe the specific concern and provide available supporting evidence. Reporters are not required to prove misconduct in advance; information sufficient to assess the concern is appropriate.

Substantive anonymous reports are assessed on their merits; the absence of contact information may limit clarification and feedback. Good-faith reporting must not result in retaliation, pressure or adverse editorial treatment of the reporter.

The reporter's identity and investigation details are protected to the extent compatible with fair procedures and applicable disclosure obligations. Absolute anonymity cannot be guaranteed where disclosure is necessary and justified. Concerns about the Editor-in-Chief or publisher may be directed through the founder's official channels with a request for independent consideration.

08. Fair investigation and protection of the scholarly record

Reports are recorded and initially assessed by an authorised person without a conflict of interest. The relevance and sufficiency of evidence are examined, and affected parties are given an opportunity to explain the circumstances and submit documentation. An allegation is not treated as an established fact. Where necessary, the editorial office requests original data, review records or independent expert assessment.

An independent panel may be established for complex cases; external specialists participate where institutional conflicts exist. The editorial office addresses publication reliability and editorial processes but does not replace an investigation by a research institution. Where justified, it contacts the relevant institution or competent authority, sharing only necessary information.

Before publication, consideration may be suspended, corrections requested or the manuscript rejected on established grounds. After publication, proportionate action may include a correction, expression of concern or retraction. The purpose is to maintain the reliability of the scholarly record and inform readers. Retraction may also be necessary for a serious honest error and does not automatically establish culpability of all authors.

Substantive changes must not be made silently. Public notices must explain the basis for decisions and link to the relevant article; evidence, correspondence and decisions are documented. Reporters and affected parties receive information about progress and outcomes within confidentiality limits. Procedural complaints or appeals are reviewed by a person not involved in the original decision. Detailed stages, deadlines, grounds and notice formats are specified in the related policies below.

09. Related policies and implementation

This page establishes general responsibilities and safeguards. Detailed rules are set out in the following separate sections of the journal website:

• Assessment and governance: Peer Review Policy; Editorial Governance and Independence Policy; Conflicts of Interest Policy.
• Research and manuscript preparation: Authorship Principles; Plagiarism Policy; Policy on the Use of Artificial Intelligence Tools; Data and Reproducibility Policy; Research Ethics Policy; Ethical Requirements for Research Involving Human Participants; Informed Consent Policy; Privacy Policy.
• Response procedures: Policy on Handling Allegations of Misconduct; Complaints and Appeals Policy; Corrections, Retractions and Post-publication Updates Policy.
• Financial conditions: Article Processing Charges (APC) Policy. The standard charge is USD 100; in 2026, publication expenses are covered by the founding university and authors pay USD 0. Funding does not alter ethical requirements or scientific criteria.

The approved version of this policy takes effect on the date of its official publication on the website. Changes are dated according to their actual implementation and do not retrospectively alter peer-review records, publication dates or previously granted licences. New concerns about earlier publications are handled under current procedures while considering the requirements applicable at the time of the research and publication.

International references

COPE Core Practices and the Principles of Transparency serve as methodological guidance. The journal's own rules and responsibility for implementing them are established by this policy and related policies.

• COPE Core Practices (PDF)
• Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing