According to me it is difficult to take action against predatory journals but if we avoid such journals then they will  automatically stop publishing after a few volumes because their main aim is to make money ! However, some authors go for these journals out of necessity. For example if they   need one or two published papers as mandatory  requirement for submission of Ph D thesis and they do not have enough time to publish them in good journals, then they will definitely opt for quick publishing in predatory online journals.

I totally agree with Dr. Subir sir that It is the present system of evaluation of research output which makes these predatory journals flourishing. In any field it takes some time to establish oneself, therefore evaluation should not be in number of research papers/ books,rather it should be on quality and ones ability to bring the good result with time.

Maybe it will have to go towards the establishment of standards for publications?

It is an uphill task to stop such predatory journals. There are numerous journals emerging rapidly. It is so natural to spot weeds among crops.

It is difficult to reach a consensus among international universities to follow an international regulation for publication by researchers, scientists and faculties.

If Web of science and Scopus indexed journals alone are taken into account for publication for award of degree, promotion and projects, the growth of such journals will be limited. Nevertheless, many predatory journals are already indexed in web of science and Scopus. I suspect that web science brought a new index ESCI to accommodate predatory and evolving predatory open access journals. 

Many researchers dream to publish in leading journals. Unfortunately, the acceptance rate is 10-20% of total submissions due to limited space. When a researcher faces continuous rejections attempting to publish his work in leading journals one by one, he loses large amount of time. He then looks for a journal which will publish rapidly and falls as prey to predatory journals. Leading journals should increase the number of articles published each year and should enlarge the editorial board to handle huge number of submissions.   

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Why_are_some_academics_publishing_their_works_in_flaky_and_predatory_journals_churning_out_quantity_rather_quality/1

Hi,

I have seen on one of the predatory journal's site a running title saying "this is a predatory journal" I have no idea who inserted this running title, but this is a good measure to warn researchers from this type of journals.

I agree with explanation given by Subir Bandyopadhyay

I guess, we may accept as an axiom that researchers who value their reputation will not attempt publishing papers in journals with doubtful reputation. However, several measures could be taken. For instance, one may think of the following.

• "Educational campaign" should be widely arranged to discourage publication in low quality predatory journals, especially with doctoral students and researchers in the beginning of their career (they may often be under the pressure and badly need to publish fast - thus, easy catch for predator journals).
• Publications in such journals should not count towards employment or promotion. On the contrary, they should be considered by employers as negative factors.
• Researchers should avoid citing papers published in predatory journals.
• Bibliometric indicators for publications in predatory journals may be organized with negative values thus decreasing the author's scores and impact. One may also think of negative score for citations to papers in predator journals.

I think co-existence of predatory journals are due to (a) too much availability of indices used as measuring tool for journals quality, unethical research and plagiarism, underestimating and lack of peer review process , outcome of lengthy process time from submission to publications by reputable scientific publishers and concept of open access publishing journals.

Most important: being a "PhD researcher" should be smart enough to know which is predatory journal which is not. As Professor Hoodbhoy in his article "Enough PhDs Thank You" wrote "Pakistan now has legions of highly paid ignoramus cartoon professors".

A very relevant question of the time. There is growing trend of predatory and fake journals throughout the world. The only intent of these journals are money making. There are many initiatives happened throughout the globe to reduce the instances of publishing in predatory journals. Most of the Universities and educational bodies have a strict policy on publishing in the predatory journals. But the practice of publishing in predatory journals are still persistent. Some of the reason for the same is as follows..

1. The lack of awareness about the quality/nature of the journal

2. Absence of the strict policy of affiliating institution/organization on publishing with predatory journals 

3. This would help them to increase their Academic Performance Indexes/Indicators.

4. Publishing for the sake of publication.

5. These platforms enable them to publish whatever the stuff they have written, even one with no or poor quality.

The best strategy for curbing the predatory journals is to stop publishing in such journals. Again this is interconnected with institutional policies. Students/researchers and academicians must be sensitized on what stands for the predatory journal and where to publish and where not.  This process has to be initiated from the undergraduate programs itself. 

Contextually, you may see one of my recently published paper on these issues.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/318350709_ACADEMIC_WRITING_AND_PUBLISHING_IN_INDIA_IS_QUALITY_A_TOUCHSTONE

Article ACADEMIC WRITING AND PUBLISHING IN INDIA: IS QUALITY A TOUCHSTONE?

I have come across this:  Predatory-journal -The Cabell’s Blacklist

https://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2017/07/25/cabells-new-predatory-journal-blacklist-review/

Another interesting observation under the title- Authorship for sale

http://retractionwatch.com/2017/09/13/authorship-sale-journals-willing-add-authors-papers-didnt-write/

You advocating researchers not to submit publications to predatory journals within the communities you are part of is surely a powerful first step.

These communities can be: your department, your whole university/research institution, the fellow scientists you happen to meet at conferences, any research-based group on social media you are part of.

For actions pertaining your own university, you may ask the librarians for help. They would, for instance, send a "warning email" to the whole university staff with a list of predatory journals to avoid submitting papers to, preferably divided per knowledge domain.

Making people aware of these journals and educating them about the loss posed by these predatory journals to the researcher community and whole system, is the Need of today

Why would anyone try to prevent submissions to alleged predatory journals, however inadvisable such actions might be?

Academics are entitled to submit their papers wherever they might choose.

If academics submit to predatory journals, it reflects on them.

So what?