ACM Policy on Authorship

Updated on May 14, 2026

Introduction

The computing community expects ACM Publications to adhere to the highest standards for quality and trustworthiness and for ACM authors to engage in responsible and ethical practices while conducting research and reporting on the results of that research in ACM Publications. The community also expects ACM authors to respect the intellectual property rights of others by providing proper credit to all those contributing to a published Work and to give proper attribution to all those whose work is included in any new Work published by ACM. Likewise, the community expects ACM and its volunteers to provide the highest quality of service throughout the publication process, including an ethical process for managing submissions and peer review, free from bias, collusion, fraud, plagiarism, deception and other forms of misconduct that erode trust in ACM Publications and in science more generally.

International Authorship Standards

To ensure that ACM’s Policy on Authorship is consistent with best practices and international publishing standards, ACM has become an active member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and is committed to ensuring that ACM’s Policy on Authorship is generally consistent with COPE’s definition of authorship, which can be found here. While there are many aspects of COPE’s definition of authorship that have influenced ACM’s Policy, there are three concepts that impacted ACM’s Authorship Policy, including:

Authors must be the “creator or originator of an idea” and/or Work
All named authors must make a substantial contribution to the Work
All named authors must be accountable for the work that was done and its presentation in a publication

Scope of Policy

This policy applies to all submitted, accepted, and published articles and abstracts in all ACM Publication venues, including ACM journals, ACM conferences, ICPS conferences, ACM magazines, and ACM newsletters, ACM books, and any other ACM publication venue. By submitting a manuscript to any of ACM’s Publications, all individuals listed as authors on those manuscripts agree to be bound by the contents of this Policy and all ACM Publications Policies, without exception.

Criteria for Authorship

ACM has established detailed criteria for determining if an individual’s contribution to a Work rises to the level of authorship or if they should be acknowledged for their contribution in the acknowledgements section of a work.

Anyone listed as an author on an ACM submission must meet all the following criteria:

They are an identifiable human being. Anonymous authorship is not permitted, although pseudonyms and/or pen names are permitted provided accurate contact information is given to ACM to fulfill this policy’s requirement that all named authors are accountable for the contents of their Work. ACM does not currently permit collective authorship.
They have made substantial and demonstrable intellectual contributions to some components of the original Work described in the manuscript, such as contributing to the conception, design, and analysis of the study reported on in the Work and participating in the drafting and/or revision of the manuscript.
They take full responsibility for all content in the published Works.

Note: All individuals who meet the above criteria should be listed as authors on the Work. The practices of gift authorship, guest authorship, ghost authorship (see the FAQ for detailed definitions of these and related terms and for discussion of related, acceptable practices), and purchased authorship are clear violations of ACM Publications Policy and when proven may have severe consequences for those found to have participated in such practices. For more information about these practices, please see the FAQ document.

Authors who meet the above authorship criteria, but who die or become incapacitated prior to publication, can be listed as co-authors with permission of their estate or next of kin.

Those who contributed to a Work, but whose contribution does not rise to the level of authorship, may be acknowledged at the end of the Work, before the Bibliography, with explicitly described roles, preferably using the roles found in the CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy). In addition, those whose contribution does rise to the level of authorship, but who are unable to publish with ACM as a result of active publication bans may be acknowledged in the acknowledgment section of the Work.

Authorship Accountability

All individuals listed as authors on an ACM submission certify that:

They are aware the manuscript has been submitted for publication to ACM. While ACM does make attempts to verify this by sending notification emails to all named authors on submissions during the submission stage and after the acceptance stage prior to publication, all named authors are responsible for providing ACM with their consent.
They agree to be held responsible and accountable for any issues relating to the correctness or integrity of the Work and compliance with all related ACM Publications Policies. All persons listed as authors on an ACM submission have the responsibility to check the entire manuscript for mistakes, inaccuracies, fraudulent data or references, unsupported conclusions, or any other problematic content that could undermine the integrity of the Work with the understanding that they will be held accountable and responsible for any issues that undermine the integrity of the Work or violate ACM Publications Policy.
They will provide ACM with a valid ORCID prior to completion of the ACM eRights process (an ORCID is a unique author ID that can be obtained from www.orcid.org). This is required for author identification purposes and to improve the normalization of publishing-related data in the ACM Digital Library.

Use of Artificial Intelligence

Over the past few years, the computing community’s use of large language models to support research and authorship has evolved rapidly, becoming a mainstream practice. ACM embraces any new technologies that have the potential to improve the efficiency and productivity of the research enterprise and assist with the authorship process.

At the same time, the use of such technologies, especially when in their infancy, introduces significant risks, including the risk of text and idea plagiarism, the potential for factual inaccuracies, fabricated or unverifiable research artifacts and citations, and the unintentional propagation of bias. These concerns raise questions about transparency, attribution, trust in scientific results, and the integrity of the scholarly record, underscoring the need for clear standards and responsible use of these technologies.

However, as with the use of any technology, especially new technology, it is incumbent upon the user of that technology to ensure its responsible use, and to be accountable for the misuse of that technology.

Rather than attempt to limit the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to conduct research or report on the results of that research by placing expectations on authors to disclose all uses of large language models in their Works, this updated Policy attempts to set clear expectations for their responsible use, as follows:

When using Artificial Intelligence to conduct research, including the design and methodology of the research project, creation and selection of data sources, designing experiments, generation and collection of data, coding, implementing models, running simulations, data analysis, testing, validating results, deploying software, archiving data and code for reproducibility, or any other aspects of the research lifecycle that are directly relevant to the conclusions of the research underlying the Work, the specific use(s) of AI tools must be described in detail in the methods section of the Work. This includes the creation of artifacts that are directly relevant to the conclusions of the research, such as code, datasets, and charts or figures that rely on the AI tools.
When using Artificial Intelligence to assist with writing an ACM submission, ACM no longer requires the disclosure of information regarding the use of AI (as distinct from AI used in the conduct of the research itself, addressed in item 1 above).

All named authors on an ACM submission will be held responsible and accountable for any problematic content contained in the submission regardless of the source of that problematic content:

In the event content integrity issues stemming from the use of AI during authorship are identified prior to publication or posting in the ACM Digital Library, ACM reserves the right to reject submissions in their entirety and impose additional penalties.
In the event content integrity issues stemming from the use of AI during authorship are identified after publication or posting in the ACM Digital Library, ACM reserves the right to retract the published Work in its entirety.

A retraction notice will be published on the citation page of the published Work, indicating the Work has been retracted because of integrity issues identified after publication, including the inclusion of fraudulent material. ACM may or may not include any reference to the use of Artificial Intelligence in the retraction notice.

Further details regarding the interpretation of ACM’s policy on the use of AI tools and illustrative examples are provided in the FAQs.

Criteria for Submission

All ACM submissions shall meet the following requirements:

That the Work submitted is not currently under review at any other publication venue, and that it will not be submitted to another publication venue unless it has been rejected or withdrawn from this venue. There may be exceptions to this requirement for certain conference Works, including submission to a non-publishing venue, such as a workshop, where the Work will not be formally published. If the author is requesting an exception, they should contact the Program Chair of the ACM conference. Posting a pre-print version of the Work to arXiv or a similar pre-print venue is not considered a prior or current publication venue and there is no need to request an exception for such postings.
That all authors have the right and intent to publish the Work in the venue to which it is submitted if the work is accepted. For conference papers, this includes the expected ability and intent to have an author of the paper register for and attend the conference to present the paper, if required. Please refer to the specific policies of individual conferences for registration and presentation requirements for named authors, including the ability to present virtually or in person.
That any prior publications on which this Work is based are documented appropriately in the Work. This documentation includes providing an explanation of the incremental contribution of a journal paper that extends prior results published in a conference paper. (In cases of double- anonymous review, this information should be supplied to the editor or program chair only.)

In addition to the above requirements, all ACM authors shall be required to comply with all other ACM Publications Policies detailed in individual Calls for Papers and Instructions for authors of individual ACM Publications, including journals, conferences, books, newsletters, etc.

Frequently Asked Questions

Please find a list of frequently asked questions and answers related to ACM's updated Policy on Authorship here.

Resources

ACM is an active member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). COPE provides guidance and standards of practice for publishers and the scientific community, as well as educational resources that will help ACM authors to follow acceptable publishing practice. The following documents should be referenced in connection with ACM's Authorship Policy:

Contact ACM

The ACM Director of Publications should be contacted for any:

Questions about the interpretation of this policy
Questions about appealing violation decisions
Requests for deviations from, or extensions to, this policy
Reporting of egregious behavior related to this policy, including purposeful evasion of the policy, false reporting, or coercion

Mailing address:

ACM Director of Publications
Association for Computing Machinery
1601 Broadway, 10th Floor
New York, NY 10019-7434
Phone: +1-212-626-0659

Or via email:

[email protected]