Authorship & Contributorship
Policies / Authorship
Authorship & Contributorship
Who qualifies as an author, how contributions are recorded, and how authorship questions are handled.
Authorship confers both credit and accountability, and TECS expects it to be assigned with honesty and transparency, reflecting the principles of the ICMJE and the guidance of COPE.
Criteria for authorship
An individual qualifies as an author only where each of the following is met:
| ▸ | a substantial contribution to the conception or design of the work, or to the acquisition, analysis or interpretation of data, or to the design or implementation of the method, system or software; |
| ▸ | substantive involvement in drafting or critically revising the manuscript; |
| ▸ | approval of the version submitted for publication; and |
| ▸ | agreement to be accountable for the integrity and accuracy of the work. |
Those who contribute without meeting all four criteria — for example funding, general supervision, or routine technical or computing support — should be recognised in the Acknowledgements.
Contributor roles (CRediT) and ORCID
Authors must describe each person’s role using the CRediT taxonomy, published with the article. The corresponding author must provide an ORCID iD, and co-authors are strongly encouraged to do so, ensuring reliable attribution.
The corresponding author and changes to authorship
The corresponding author manages communication, confirms that every author meets the criteria and has approved the submission, and provides required documentation. Any change to the author list after submission requires the written agreement of all authors, including any person added or removed, with a stated reason; authorship is not normally altered after acceptance, and such requests follow COPE guidance.
Unacceptable practices and disputes
The journal prohibits ghost, gift or honorary, and guest authorship, and treats such practices as misconduct. Generative-AI tools cannot be authors. The journal does not arbitrate the substance of authorship disputes but asks the parties and, where necessary, their institutions to resolve them under the relevant COPE flowchart, and may pause consideration until a dispute is settled.
