Privacy Policy

1.Who this policy covers

This policy covers four groups: journal staff who run a journal on the platform (editors, managing editors and production staff), authors who submit manuscripts, reviewers who are invited to review, and readers who visit journal websites.

For manuscripts, reviews and editorial records, the journal is the controller of the data and we process it on the journal's behalf. For accounts, billing and this website, we are the controller.

2.What we collect

• Account details: name, email, institution, role and, where provided, ORCID iD.
• Manuscript records: files, metadata, declarations, author lists and correspondence submitted to a journal.
• Peer review records: invitations, reports, recommendations and decisions.
• Journal website usage: pages viewed, downloads and approximate country, used for Citation Stats with bots filtered out.
• Forms on this website: the details you enter when you sign up or write to us.

3.How we use it

• To run the editorial workflow a journal has configured: submission, checks, peer review, decisions, production and publication.
• To send the emails that workflow requires, in the journal's name.
• To register DOIs and deposit metadata with registration agencies and indexing services when an article is published.
• To provide support, prevent abuse and keep the service secure.
• To bill journals for their plan.

4.Unpublished manuscripts

Unpublished manuscripts are confidential. They are visible only to the people the journal's editorial process allows. They are never used to train AI models, never sold and never shown to anyone outside that process.

AI Integrity Check compares manuscript content against published sources to produce its report. This comparison does not add the manuscript to any public or shared database.

5.Reviewer identities

Reviewer identities are protected according to the journal's review model. Under single-blind or double-blind review, reviewer names are not shown to authors. Under open review, names are shown only with the reviewer's agreement.

6.Sharing

We share personal data only as needed to run the service:

• With the journal whose workflow you take part in.
• With DOI registration agencies and indexing services, limited to the metadata of published articles.
• With infrastructure providers that host and deliver the service under written data protection terms.
• When required by law, after checking that the request is valid.

7.Retention

Published article metadata is kept permanently as part of the scholarly record. Editorial records are kept for as long as the journal requires them for research integrity and audit purposes. Account data is deleted or anonymised within 90 days of an account being closed, unless the journal's records require it to be kept.

8.Security

Data is encrypted in transit and at rest. Access is limited by role, recorded in an audit trail and reviewed regularly. Single sign-on is available for institutions on the Review Collection plan.

9.Your choices and rights

You can view and update your account details at any time. You can ask for a copy of your data, its correction or its deletion, and you can object to processing. Where a journal is the controller, we will pass your request to that journal and support it in responding. Write to us through the contact page and we will reply within 30 days.

10.Cookies

This website and journal websites use essential cookies for sign-in, security and the form check on sign up and contact pages. We do not use advertising cookies.

11.Changes to this policy

If we make a material change, we will notify journal administrators by email before it takes effect and publish the revised policy on this page.