As a master’s student in 2011, researcher Silvia De Cesare published a paper in Implications Philosophiques. In June 2025, De Cesare learned that someone had published a version of her article in the International Journal of Applied Science and Research (IJASR) in 2020. The paper, a near-verbatim copy of De Cesare’s article apart from the omission of a few footnotes, listed Marcellin Lunanga Mukunda, of the University of Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, as its sole author. But Mukunda denies publishing the paper, telling us he had been hacked, or perhaps robbed, as an explanation for how his name appeared on the paper.

In correspondence De Cesare contacted the editors of IJASR to report the plagiarism of her work and request the offending paper’s retraction. An editor assistant at IJASR replied, saying the journal would review the matter and remove the paper if the author did not provide a satisfactory response. After five months with no word from the publisher, De Cesare followed up again, and less than two weeks later, the plagiarizing paper was removed from the journal’s database. IJASR has not posted a retraction notice on their website.

Source https://retractionwatch.com/2026/02/05/journal-silently-removes-paper-for-plagiarism-author-claims-identity-theft/

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