IYH Detectable fraud is no longer anecdotal noise but a network phenomenon: < 1 % of editors enable ≈30 % of retractions; paper-mill articles double every 1.5 y—10× faster than legitimate science. Cutting-edge graph/statistical methods reveal modular “fraud supply chains” that hop between journals to evade de-indexing.

Fraud growth outpaces science 10:1. Current policing (≈100 journal de-indexings/y) is an order-of-magnitude too small.

Network, not lone wolves: < 1 % of editors can explain ≈30 % of a large journal’s retractions.

Fraud doubles every 18 months: Faster than Moore’s-law pace for legitimate publications (15 y doubling).

Journal hopping: When a journal is de-indexed, fraud brokers instantly shift to new venues, retaining >70 active journals.

Subfield selectivity: Closely related RNA topics show retraction rates from 0.1 % (CRISPR) to ≈4 % (lncRNAs), exposing targeted exploitation not uniform sloppiness.

R.A.K. Richardson, S.S. Hong, J.A. Byrne, T. Stoeger, & L.A.N. Amaral, The entities enabling scientific fraud at scale are large, resilient, and growing rapidly, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 122 (32) e2420092122, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2420092122 (2025).