The challenges of predatory journals and paper mills in mathematics: A glimpse at the parallel universe of fake science

In November 2023, Clarivate Plc announced that it had excluded the entire field of mathematics from the most recent edition of its influential list of authors of highly cited papers because of massive citation manipulation, which in return influences the so-called "Shanghai ranking" of top universities (or those claiming to be top). While most mathematicians would probably not care, the exclusion is in fact the tip of the iceberg of a parallel universe of predatory and mega-journals whose main purpose is to offer publishing opportunities for whoever is willing to pay the right price. I will explain how the system works, why we should care, and what measures we can all take against. In preparation, I invite you to think about the following questions: How often have you been contacted in the past months to attend a conference not in your field / submit a paper to or edit a special issue in a journal you don't know / review an article within 10 days or so? What do you know about the following journals: "Mathematics", "Axioms" (published by MDPI), "Chaos, solitons, fractals" (Elsevier), "Advances in Difference Equations" (Springer)? Do you know the following mathematicians: Abdon Atangana, Dumitru Baleanu, Hari M. Srivastava?