Tortured phrases

Introduction

ImportantProblem statement

Tortured phrases are the result of authors using paraphrasing software (e.g., SpinBot) to copy-paraphrase-paste content from already published articles, in order to produce a seemingly new article. This can lead to deformed scientific vocabulary, with phrases such as “bosom peril” instead of “breast cancer”, “sulphuric corrosive” instead of “sulphuric acid”, or “shrewd matrix” instead of “smart grid”. Tortured Phrases are mainly spotted in paper-mill products that bypass peer-review and editorial decisions by hiding plagiarism (McIntosh et al. 2026).

Problematic Paper Screener statistics as of August 13, 2026. Captured from https://www.irit.fr/~Guillaume.Cabanac/problematic-paper-screener.

Key resources

Note“Tortured phrases”

Explanation of the problem by Cabanac et al. (2021)

NoteProblematic Paper Screener (PPS)

Automatic screening of the scientific literature for tortured phrases and other problems (https://www.irit.fr/~Guillaume.Cabanac/problematic-paper-screener). Described in Cabanac et al. (2022).

Bibliography

Cabanac, Guillaume, Cyril Labbé, and Alexander Magazinov. 2021. “Tortured Phrases: A Dubious Writing Style Emerging in Science. Evidence of Critical Issues Affecting Established Journals.” Version 1. Preprint, arXiv. https://doi.org/10.48550/ARXIV.2107.06751.

Cabanac, Guillaume, Cyril Labbé, and Alexander Magazinov. 2022. “The ‘Problematic Paper Screener’ Automatically Selects Suspect Publications for Post-Publication (Re)assessment.” arXiv:2210.04895. Preprint, arXiv, October 7. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2210.04895.

McIntosh, Leslie D., Anna Abalkina, Achal Agrawal, et al. 2026. “Forensic Scientometrics (FoSci) Report 2026: Understanding, Detecting, and Documenting Manipulation in the Research Ecosystem.” Version 3. Preprint, Figshare, July 17. 1012969 Bytes. https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.32178456.v3.