Session 1b)
What editors need to know about promises and dangers of AI and the new wave of digital tools

9.15am-10.15am – parallel session

The rise of digital tools fuelled by large language models, machine learning, and other forms of AI offer great promise for the research and information sectors, but also have serious associated risks. Efforts to root out paper mills, fabricated or altered data, and research fraud have traditionally relied on the diligence of editors and reviewers to identify bad manuscripts during review. Today, however, increased automation has enabled both industrial level fraud and more sophisticated fakery that is far harder to detect. At the same time, fragmentation of research communities has reduced the applicability of the markers of trust that have traditionally assisted editors and reviewers. On the other hand, there are those within the publishing world that are fighting back, developing their own tools, and taking a more sophisticated approach to safeguarding the integrity of the scholarly record.