Review Process Policy

Jurnal Computech & Bisnis (JCB), published by STMIK Mardira Indonesia, is committed to maintaining a rigorous, fair, transparent, and independent peer-review process. Peer review is an essential part of the journal’s editorial process and is intended to evaluate the scientific quality, originality, relevance, methodological soundness, and ethical integrity of submitted manuscripts.

JCB uses a double-blind peer-review process, in which the identities of authors and reviewers are concealed from each other to the extent reasonably possible. Editorial decisions are based on the scholarly merit of the manuscript, its relevance to the journal’s Focus and Scope, the reviewers’ assessments, and the editor’s independent judgment.

Submission to JCB does not guarantee acceptance or publication.

1. Initial Editorial Screening

All manuscripts submitted to JCB undergo an initial editorial screening before being sent for external peer review.

During this stage, the editorial team assesses whether the manuscript:

Falls within the journal’s Focus and Scope.
Presents a clear research problem, objective, and scholarly contribution.
Demonstrates an appropriate level of originality and relevance to computer science, informatics, or related fields covered by the journal.
Follows the journal’s author guidelines, manuscript template, and submission requirements.
Provides sufficient methodological information for the work to be assessed.
Meets the journal’s basic standards for research ethics, authorship, citation, and publication integrity.
Includes the required declarations, such as conflict of interest, funding information, and other statements applicable to the submission.
Meets the journal’s requirements concerning originality and similarity screening.

Manuscripts that are clearly outside the journal’s scope, fail to meet essential submission requirements, lack a meaningful scholarly contribution, or raise serious ethical concerns may be rejected at the initial screening stage or returned to the authors for correction before further consideration.

Passing the initial screening does not imply that a manuscript will be accepted.

2. Plagiarism and Research Integrity Screening

Submitted manuscripts may be screened using Turnitin or another appropriate similarity-detection tool as part of the editorial assessment.

JCB uses an overall similarity score of 20% as an initial screening guideline, subject to contextual evaluation under the journal’s Plagiarism Policy. The similarity score is not treated as conclusive proof of plagiarism. Editors assess the location, nature, extent, and context of matched material before deciding whether clarification, revision, further investigation, or rejection is appropriate.

Where necessary, the editorial team may also examine potential concerns involving duplicate publication, data integrity, inappropriate reuse of material, undisclosed conflicts of interest, or other violations of publication ethics.

Serious concerns may be handled under the journal’s Allegation of Research Misconduct Policy.

3. Assignment of Reviewers

Manuscripts that pass the initial editorial screening may be assigned to qualified reviewers with relevant expertise in the manuscript’s subject area, methodology, or technical domain.

JCB aims to obtain assessments from at least two independent reviewers for manuscripts sent for external peer review. The editor may seek additional reviews when the subject is interdisciplinary, the reports conflict substantially, or further expert assessment is necessary.

Reviewers are selected based on relevant scholarly expertise, research experience, methodological competence, and their ability to provide an objective assessment.

The editorial team will seek to avoid assigning reviewers who have actual or potential conflicts of interest with the manuscript or its authors. Reviewers must disclose relevant conflicts and decline the invitation when their impartiality could reasonably be questioned.

The journal may invite additional reviewers or replace a reviewer if a review is not received within a reasonable period, is insufficiently substantive, or raises concerns about impartiality.

4. Double-Blind Peer Review

JCB applies a double-blind peer-review process in which author identities are not disclosed to reviewers and reviewer identities are not disclosed to authors during the review process.

Authors are expected to remove identifying information from the main manuscript file where appropriate and follow the journal’s submission instructions for anonymized manuscripts.

The journal will make reasonable efforts to preserve anonymity. However, complete anonymity cannot be guaranteed, particularly when the research is publicly available as a preprint, uses identifiable datasets, or is conducted within a highly specialized research community.

Reviewers must not attempt to identify authors unnecessarily or disclose their review assignments. Authors and reviewers are expected to respect the confidentiality of the process.

5. Review Criteria

Reviewers are asked to evaluate manuscripts according to criteria relevant to the type of research submitted. These may include:

5.1 Originality and Scholarly Contribution

Does the manuscript address a relevant and clearly defined research problem?
Does it demonstrate a meaningful contribution beyond routine implementation or a straightforward application of existing techniques?
Is the novelty or significance of the work adequately explained and supported by relevant literature?

5.2 Literature Review and Research Context

Is the literature review relevant, sufficiently current, and critically discussed?
Does the manuscript identify a meaningful research gap or problem?
Are important related studies and appropriate comparisons considered?

5.3 Methodological Soundness

Are the research design, methods, algorithms, system architecture, experiments, or analytical procedures appropriate for the research objectives?
Are the methods described with sufficient detail to support evaluation and, where feasible, replication?
Are the datasets, sampling procedures, implementation details, experimental conditions, and analytical methods adequately explained where applicable?

5.4 Evaluation and Validity of Results

Are the experiments or evaluations appropriate to the claims made?
Are the results presented accurately and interpreted objectively?
Are suitable baselines, comparison methods, evaluation metrics, or validation procedures used where relevant?
Are limitations, sources of uncertainty, and threats to validity discussed appropriately?

5.5 Technical Quality and Reproducibility

For computational and informatics research, reviewers may assess the clarity and correctness of algorithms, software implementations, system designs, cybersecurity evaluations, IoT architectures, datasets, and computational experiments.

Where appropriate, reviewers may consider whether source code, data, configurations, or other research artifacts are sufficiently documented or accessible to support verification. The absence of public code or data is not automatically grounds for rejection; the assessment depends on the nature of the research, ethical and legal constraints, and the journal’s applicable requirements.

5.6 Discussion and Conclusions

Are the findings interpreted in relation to the research questions and relevant literature?
Do the conclusions follow from the evidence presented?
Are the practical or theoretical implications explained without unsupported claims?
Are limitations and potential directions for further research appropriately addressed?

5.7 Presentation, References, and Research Ethics

Is the manuscript logically organized and written clearly?
Are figures, tables, equations, and references accurate and appropriately presented?
Are sources cited adequately?
Are relevant ethical requirements, funding information, author contributions, and conflicts of interest disclosed where applicable?

Reviewers are expected to provide constructive comments that help editors make informed decisions and help authors improve the quality of their manuscripts.

6. Reviewer Recommendations

After evaluating a manuscript, reviewers are asked to provide a recommendation. The available recommendations may include:

Accept: The manuscript meets the journal’s requirements and requires no substantive revision.
Minor Revision: The manuscript is potentially publishable after limited corrections or clarifications.
Major Revision: Substantial revision is required before the manuscript can be reconsidered.
Reject: The manuscript does not meet the journal’s standards for scope, originality, scholarly contribution, methodological soundness, research integrity, or overall quality.

Reviewer recommendations are advisory. The final decision rests with the responsible editor, who considers the review reports, the manuscript’s merits, the journal’s policies, and any relevant ethical concerns.

The editor is not required to adopt a reviewer recommendation without independent assessment.

7. Editorial Decision

Following peer review, the editor communicates the decision to the corresponding author through the journal’s submission system or official editorial communication channel.

The decision may be based on the reviewers’ reports, the manuscript’s scholarly contribution, the quality of its methodology and evaluation, its relevance to JCB, and compliance with publication ethics.

Where reviewer reports conflict, the editor may seek an additional review, request clarification, or make an independent decision based on the available evidence.

Acceptance is granted only when the editor determines that the manuscript meets the journal’s publication requirements. A positive reviewer recommendation does not automatically guarantee acceptance.

8. Revision and Resubmission

When revision is requested, authors must submit a revised manuscript and a point-by-point response explaining how each reviewer and editor comment has been addressed.

Authors should clearly identify substantive changes in the revised manuscript using the format specified by the journal.

If authors disagree with a reviewer comment, they may provide a reasoned explanation supported by relevant evidence or scholarly justification. Authors are not required to accept every suggestion, but they must respond respectfully and substantively to the issues raised.

Revised manuscripts may be returned to the original reviewers, sent to new reviewers, or assessed directly by the editor, depending on the nature and extent of the revisions.

The journal may reject a manuscript if the revision fails to address essential concerns or if new issues emerge during reassessment.

9. Review Timeline

JCB aims to process manuscripts as efficiently as possible while allowing sufficient time for careful scholarly evaluation.

The time required for editorial screening, reviewer assignment, peer review, revision, and final decision may vary depending on manuscript complexity, reviewer availability, the number of revision rounds, and the need for additional assessment.

The journal may send reminders to reviewers and seek replacement reviewers when necessary. Authors will be informed of significant changes in the status of their manuscripts through the journal’s submission system or official editorial communication channels where feasible.

Any review-time targets displayed on the journal’s website should reflect the journal’s actual editorial performance and should be reviewed periodically.

10. Confidentiality and Ethical Responsibilities

Manuscripts under review are confidential documents. Reviewers and editors must not share, distribute, or use unpublished information from a manuscript for personal, professional, or commercial advantage.

Reviewers must provide objective, evidence-based, and respectful comments. Personal criticism, discriminatory remarks, and unsupported accusations are not acceptable.

Editors must handle manuscripts impartially and protect confidential information obtained through the editorial process. Any suspected research misconduct or serious ethical concern must be handled in accordance with the relevant JCB policies.

The use of generative artificial intelligence or other external tools in the review process must comply with the journal’s applicable AI-use and confidentiality requirements. Reviewers must not upload confidential manuscripts or identifiable unpublished research materials to external AI services where doing so would breach confidentiality, data protection, or journal policy.

11. Conflicts of Interest

Reviewers and editors must disclose actual, potential, or reasonably perceived conflicts of interest that could affect their impartiality.

Individuals with a relevant conflict must decline or withdraw from the review or editorial handling when impartiality could reasonably be questioned. The journal may appoint an alternative reviewer or independent editor to ensure that the manuscript receives a fair assessment.

Authors must also disclose relevant conflicts of interest in accordance with the journal’s Conflict of Interest Policy.

12. Appeals and Complaints

Authors who believe that an editorial decision resulted from a significant factual error, a material procedural irregularity, or a demonstrable misunderstanding of the manuscript may submit a reasoned appeal through the journal’s official editorial contact channels.

An appeal must identify the specific grounds for reconsideration and provide relevant supporting information. Disagreement with a negative decision, without substantive grounds, does not automatically justify reconsideration.

Appeals will be assessed by the Editor-in-Chief or another appropriate editor who was not materially involved in the original decision, where feasible. If the appeal concerns the Editor-in-Chief or a serious conflict of interest, an independent person designated by the publisher or another appropriate representative should oversee the assessment.

The journal’s decision following an appeal will be based on the available evidence and applicable editorial policies.

13. Post-Review and Post-Publication Responsibilities

Peer review does not eliminate the authors’ responsibility for the accuracy and integrity of their published work.

If a substantive error, research-integrity concern, or ethical issue is identified after publication, JCB will assess the matter under its relevant policies, including its Allegation of Research Misconduct Policy, Post-Publication Discussion Policy, and Correction and Retraction Policy.

The journal may issue a correction, expression of concern, or retraction when justified by the evidence and the circumstances.

14. Editorial Independence and Quality Assurance

JCB is committed to maintaining editorial independence and consistent peer-review standards. Editorial decisions must be based on scholarly merit, methodological rigor, originality, relevance, ethical compliance, and the evidence available to the editor.

The journal will periodically review its peer-review procedures to identify opportunities for improvement, maintain consistency, and support the quality of its published research.

Jurnal Computech & Bisnis (JCB), published by STMIK Mardira Indonesia, considers rigorous peer review an essential component of responsible scholarly publishing and is committed to ensuring that every manuscript is assessed fairly and in accordance with the journal’s editorial standards.