Protecting Intellectual Property

Management Science Advances (MSA) treats submitted manuscripts and all associated peer-review materials as confidential. Authors are entitled to expect that reviewers, editors, Editorial Board members, Guest Editors, Editorial Staff, and other individuals who obtain access to a submitted manuscript through the editorial process will respect the confidentiality and intellectual property contained in the submission.

Unpublished information, ideas, data, methods, analyses, results, figures, tables, models, algorithms, computational procedures, or other material contained in a submitted manuscript must not be used for personal, professional, academic, financial, or commercial advantage and must not be incorporated into another person's work without appropriate authorization from the authors.

Confidentiality of Submitted Manuscripts

Submitted manuscripts, supplementary files, correspondence, peer-review reports, editorial assessments, and other materials associated with the evaluation of a manuscript must be treated as confidential.

Editors and reviewers must not disclose, distribute, reproduce, or share unpublished manuscript content with unauthorized third parties. Access to submitted material should be limited to individuals whose involvement is reasonably necessary for the editorial evaluation and peer-review process.

Information obtained through peer review must not be used to disadvantage the authors or to benefit the reviewer, editor, another researcher, an institution, a commercial organization, or any other party.

Responsibilities of Peer Reviewers

Reviewers must respect the intellectual property rights of authors and must not appropriate unpublished ideas, methods, data, results, interpretations, models, or other scholarly contributions encountered during peer review.

Reviewers must not share manuscripts, supplementary files, review reports, or other confidential materials with colleagues or other individuals without authorization from the responsible editor. Where additional expertise is considered necessary, the reviewer should contact the responsible editor rather than independently involving another person in the review.

Detailed requirements concerning reviewer responsibilities are provided in the journal's Peer Reviewer Conduct and Intellectual Property policy.

Generative AI and Confidential Material

Editors and reviewers must not upload submitted manuscripts, manuscript excerpts, figures, tables, supplementary materials, review materials, editorial correspondence, or other confidential content obtained through the editorial process to generative AI systems or AI-assisted tools.

Such use may compromise manuscript confidentiality, intellectual property, data protection, or the rights of authors and is not permitted under the journal's editorial and peer-review policies.

Detailed requirements concerning the use of generative AI and AI-assisted technologies are provided in the journal's Use of Generative AI and AI-Assisted Tools policy.

Author and Reviewer Identities

MSA follows a double-blind peer-review process. Reviewer identities are not disclosed to authors, and identifying information concerning authors should not be provided to reviewers as part of the blinded manuscript materials.

Authors must not attempt to identify, contact, influence, or communicate directly with reviewers concerning the evaluation of their manuscript. If a reviewer's identity becomes known to an author independently of the journal, the author should not contact the reviewer regarding the manuscript, review report, or editorial decision.

Any communication concerning the peer-review process must be directed through the Editorial Office or the responsible editor.

Suspected Misuse of Confidential Material

If an author, reviewer, editor, or other party becomes aware of suspected unauthorized use of unpublished manuscript material, breach of confidentiality, inappropriate appropriation of intellectual property, or another irregularity affecting confidential editorial material, the concern should be reported to the Editorial Office or the Editor-in-Chief.

Such concerns will be assessed in accordance with the journal's Publication Ethics Statement and Procedures for Dealing with Allegations of Unethical Behaviour.

Copyright and Published Material

This policy primarily concerns the protection of unpublished manuscripts and intellectual property during the editorial and peer-review process. Copyright ownership, the CC BY 4.0 license, reuse of published material, third-party material, and permissions are governed separately by the journal's Copyright and Licensing policy.