I. RESEARCH INTEGRITY AND PLAGIARISM POLICY

The Journal of Science and Technology – Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City (hereinafter referred to as the Journal) is committed to maintaining the highest standards of scientific integrity. All manuscripts submitted to the Journal must strictly comply with regulations regarding plagiarism and intellectual property rights.

1. Similarity Control Process Before entering the peer-review process, all manuscripts undergo an originality check using Turnitin software (https://www.turnitin.com).

• Permissible Limits: The total similarity index must not exceed 30%, and similarity with a single reference source must not exceed 10%.
• Requirements: The Journal maintains a zero-tolerance policy toward any form of plagiarism or research misconduct. Depending on the severity, violations may result in manuscript rejection, article retraction, or notification to relevant authorities.

2. Definitions of Plagiarism Plagiarism involves the use of ideas, language, data, or other creative works of others without proper acknowledgment. Specific forms include:

• Verbatim Copying: Presenting phrases, sentences, or entire sections from another source as one's own work without citation.
• Improper Paraphrasing: Altering the sentence structure or wording of a source while retaining the original ideas without clearly citing the reference.
• Data and Idea Plagiarism: Using research methods, statistical data, charts, images, or models from another author without consent or proper citation.
• Self-plagiarism: Reusing significant portions of the author’s own previously published work (articles, theses, conference reports, etc.) without clear disclosure.
• Mosaic Plagiarism: Patching together content from various sources to create a new text that lacks originality and fails to provide full citations.
• Citation Violations: Misrepresenting information or failing to provide sources for specialized knowledge (information that is not considered common knowledge).

3. Author Commitments Upon submission, the author (or the representative of the author group) is responsible for confirming the following in writing:

• The manuscript is an original work and has not been published previously in any form or language (in whole or in part).
• The manuscript is not currently under consideration and will not be submitted simultaneously to other journals or publications until a formal decision is made by the Editorial Board.

4. Violation Handling Procedure If plagiarism is detected at any stage (screening, peer review, or post-publication), the Editorial Board will conduct an independent investigation. Based on the severity, the Editor-in-Chief reserves the right to:

• Request an explanation from the authors and require comprehensive corrections or additional citations.
• Reject the manuscript for further consideration or publication.
• Rescind the results and retract the published article (in cases where the article has already been released).
• Formally notify the author’s host institution or governing body regarding the misconduct.

Note: The decision of the Editor-in-Chief is final in all matters concerning publication ethics violations.

II. CONFLICT OF INTEREST POLICY

A Conflict of Interest (COI) arises when personal, financial, or non-financial relationships have the potential to influence the objectivity and integrity of the research, peer review, or publication decisions.

• Author Responsibility: Authors are obligated to disclose all potential conflicts of interest at the time of submission. This includes identifying organizations or individuals that supported the research or contributed to the content and format of the paper (conception, design, data collection/analysis, drafting).
• Disclosure of Funding: Authors must clearly identify the sources of financial support for the research and manuscript preparation. The role of these funding parties should be briefly described in the Acknowledgements
• Editorial Responsibility: The Editorial Board is committed to screening and ensuring that the peer-review process remains independent and transparent.
• Handling Violations: If a conflict of interest is discovered after publication, the Journal will investigate according to standard protocols. Depending on the severity, the Journal reserves the right to issue a correction or perform a retraction.

III. PEER REVIEW POLICY

The Journal employs a rigorous double-blind peer review process to ensure scientific quality, originality, and absolute objectivity.

Process and Standards

• Scope: All original research articles and systematic reviews must undergo independent peer review.
• Confidentiality: The identities of both authors and reviewers are kept strictly confidential throughout the evaluation process.
• Reviewer Selection: Each manuscript is sent to at least 02 independent reviewers with relevant expertise. At least one reviewer must be external to the authors' home institution. Reviewers are selected from domestic and international databases, holding a Ph.D. degree or higher and a proven publication record in the relevant field.

Reviewer Ethics

• Information Security: Reviewers must not disclose the contents of the manuscript or communicate with any third party other than the Editorial Board.
• Intellectual Property: It is strictly forbidden to use ideas, data, or results from the manuscript for personal gain before the article is officially published.
• Transparency: Reviewers must immediately notify the Editorial Board if they detect a conflict of interest, signs of plagiarism, or data fabrication.
• Sanctions: Any violation of reviewer ethics will result in permanent removal from the Journal’s reviewer database.

IV. AUTHORSHIP CHANGE POLICY

The list of authors and the order of priority must be agreed upon before submission. Any subsequent changes are strictly controlled.

• Pre-publication Changes: Requests to change the author list (adding, removing, or reordering) after the manuscript has been accepted are considered only in exceptional circumstances. The Corresponding Author must provide a clear written explanation along with written consent (via email or signed letter) from all authors listed in the original submission.
• Decision Authority: The Editor-in-Chief has the final authority to approve or deny requests for authorship changes. This decision is final and not subject to appeal.
• Post-publication Changes: Once an article has been published on the Online First system or in the Printed version, the Journal will not accept any requests to add, delete, or change the order of author names under any circumstances.