Policy & Ethicsplagiarism detectionresearch integrityretractionstext spinners
Journal Corrects Retraction Over Tortured Phrases
7.2
Sage's Journal of X-Ray Science and Technology corrected a retraction in January after a February 2022 cardiology paper was flagged for 'tortured phrases' that appeared to evade plagiarism checks. Researchers including Guillaume Cabanac showed the phrases match outputs from spinbot-style text spinners rather than large language models, prompting publishers to update notices and consider improved screening and fingerprint databases.
Key Points
- 1Flagged tortured phrases in a 2022 cardiology paper indicate deliberate text manipulation using synonym substitution
- 2Show that such phrases stem from spinbot-style 'text spinners', not contemporary large language models
- 3Urge publishers to refine retraction notices and screening tools using 8,000-term fingerprint database
Scoring Rationale
Clarifies publisher error and origin of tortured phrases; useful for research integrity but limited novel technical advancement.
Sources
Public references used for this report.
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