ArticleThe Journal of law, medicine & ethics : a journal of the American Society of Law, Medicine & Ethics2015
Detecting, preventing, and responding to "fraudsters" in internet research: ethics and tradeoffs.
Article in The Journal of law, medicine & ethics : a journal of the American Society of Law, Medicine & Ethics, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 247 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
247 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Adherence of online surveys on mental health during the early part of the COVID-19 outbreak to standard reporting guidelines: A systematic review.Asian journal of psychiatry · 2021Pooled it
- Habit-formation strategies enhance long-term outcomes of a self-compassionate touch micropractice: a randomized controlled trial.Scientific reports · 2026Trial
- Recruitment Source and Participant Retention in a Digital HIV Prevention Intervention for Young Black and Latino Men and Transgender Women: Secondary Analysis of the HealthMpowerment 2.0 Randomized Controlled Trial.JMIR formative research · 2026Trial
- Reddit for research recruitment? Social media as a novel clinical trial recruitment tool for adolescent and young adult (AYA) cancer survivors.Journal of cancer survivorship : research and practice · 2026Trial
- Acceptability, Feasibility, and Outcome Responsiveness of the Joint Effort Mobile App for Promoting Lower-Risk Cannabis Use Among Young Adults: Pilot Randomized Controlled Trial.JMIR mHealth and uHealth · 2026Trial
- Comparison of remote to hybrid methods on recruitment and retention rates in a smoking cessation trial.Drug and alcohol dependence · 2026Trial
- Exploring Methods to Mitigate Fraud in Web-Based Surveys: Multicase Study Analysis.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Trial
- Mitigating fraud in a fully decentralized clinical trial of a digital health intervention.Annals of behavioral medicine : a publication of the Society of Behavioral Medicine · 2025Trial
- Recruitment of Young Gay, Bisexual, and Other Men Who Have Sex With Men for a Web-Based Human Papillomavirus Vaccination Intervention: Differences in Participant Characteristics and Study Engagement by Recruitment Source in a Randomized Controlled Trial.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Trial
- Bot or Not? Detecting and Managing Participant Deception When Conducting Digital Research Remotely: Case Study of a Randomized Controlled Trial.Journal of medical Internet research · 2023Trial
- Efficacy of the Outsmart HPV Intervention: A Randomized Controlled Trial to Increase HPV Vaccination among Young Gay, Bisexual, and Other Men Who Have Sex with Men.Cancer epidemiology, biomarkers & prevention : a publication of the American Association for Cancer Research, cosponsored by the American Society of Preventive Oncology · 2023Trial
- A randomized controlled trial of social media interventions for risky drinking among adolescents and emerging adults.Drug and alcohol dependence · 2022Trial
- An Identity-Affirming Web Application to Help Sexual and Gender Minority Youth Cope With Minority Stress: Pilot Randomized Controlled Trial.Journal of medical Internet research · 2022Trial
- A social media intervention for cannabis use among emerging adults: Randomized controlled trial.Drug and alcohol dependence · 2022Trial
- Methods for Authenticating Participants in Fully Web-Based Mobile App Trials from the iReach Project: Cross-sectional Study.JMIR mHealth and uHealth · 2021Trial
- User-informed marketing versus standard description to drive demand for evidence-based therapy: A randomized controlled trial.The American psychologist · 2020Trial
- Detecting and Mitigating Fraudulent Participation: Lessons Learned from a Mixed Methods Study.Journal of mixed methods research · 2026Article
- Practical Fraud Detection and Prevention in Incentivized Online Surveys: Secondary Analysis of the ADOPT Study.Journal of medical Internet research · 2026Article
- Sexual Racism and Mental Health Among Asian American Sexual Minority Men: The Moderating Role of Internalized Racism.Psychology of sexual orientation and gender diversity · 2026Article
- Battling the Bots and Defending Against Fraudulent Responses in an International Community-Engaged Web-Based Survey With People Living With Long COVID: Methodological Study.Journal of medical Internet research · 2026Article
187 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Internet-based health research is increasing, and often offers financial incentives but fraudulent behavior by participants can result. Specifically, eligible or ineligible individuals may enter the study multiple times and receive undeserved financial compensation. We review past experiences and approaches to this problem and propose several new strategies. Researchers can detect and prevent Internet research fraud in four broad ways: (1) through the questionnaire/instrument (e.g., including certain questions in survey; and software for administering survey); (2) through participants' non-questionnaire data and seeking external validation (e.g., checking data for same email addresses, usernames, passwords, and/or fake addresses or phone numbers; (3) through computer information, (e.g., IP addresses and cookies), and 4) through study design (e.g., avoid lump sum compensation and interviewing participants). These approaches each have pros and cons, and raise ethical, legal, and logistical questions, given that ethical tensions can emerge between preserving the integrity of research vs. protecting the privacy and confidentiality of study respondents. While past discussions concerning the ethics of online research have tended to focus on the participants' ability to trust the researchers, needs now arise to examine researchers' abilities to trust the participants. This analysis has several critical implications for future practice, policy, and research.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.