1. Consent to participate

Participation must be voluntary. Where consent is required, it must be obtained before a person is included in research procedures or their data are collected for research. Participants may decline, skip a question, take a break or stop participating without punishment or other adverse consequences for that decision.

Consent must:

• express a free decision without pressure, coercion, deception or undue influence;
• be based on information in an understandable language and accessible form, taking account of literacy, age and decision-making capacity;
• cover the specific study, procedures, uses of data and intended ways of presenting the findings;
• allow separate choices concerning optional activities, such as recording an interview, future contact or open data sharing, where such choices are possible;
• be documented in a manner consistent with applicable requirements and the approved protocol.

Separate uses of data should not be unnecessarily bundled into mandatory blanket consent. If a procedure is essential to the study, this must be explained beforehand; declining it must not have consequences beyond participation in that procedure or study.

Silence, attendance at a meeting, platform registration, an official instruction or permission from an administration do not by themselves establish consent. In an online survey, a deliberate action after reading the participant information may document consent if this procedure is permissible and clearly described. Exceptions to full advance disclosure are considered only under section 3.

Example of a consent-to-participate statement

Consent to participate: Voluntary informed consent in [written / electronic / oral] form was obtained from all participants before their inclusion in the study. The procedure for obtaining and documenting consent was [brief description].

The statement must reflect the actual process. Where consent was not obtained from all participants or different procedures were used, the relevant groups and grounds for exceptions must be specified.

2. Information provided to participants

Before deciding, participants must receive clear information about:

• the study’s purpose, researchers, organisations, funding sources and significant institutional relationships;
• why they are being invited, the procedures, duration of participation and nature of the questions;
• possible psychological, social, legal, professional and other risks, inconveniences and expected benefits, without a promise of guaranteed personal advantage;
• the information, recordings, images and technical metadata to be collected, and any planned linkage of data from different sources;
• purposes of use, recipients, access arrangements, retention periods or criteria, safeguards and methods of data destruction;
• future use, repository deposit, cross-border transfer or use of external services, where planned and applicable;
• how findings will be presented, the possibility of identification and any need for separate consent for publication;
• limits to confidentiality and planned action in the event of a risk of serious harm or other applicable grounds for disclosure;
• remuneration, compensation, expense reimbursement and the arrangements if participation ends early;
• the right to decline, not answer particular questions and stop participating, and the limits to withdrawing data;
• safe ways to contact the researcher and, where available, an independent body for questions and complaints.

Participants must have sufficient time for questions and decisions and, where needed, interpretation or other accessible support. The researcher checks understanding of significant conditions and provides a copy of the information in a safe and appropriate form; giving someone a document must not create an additional risk of revealing their participation.

When studying unlawful behaviour, researchers must not promise absolute confidentiality if they cannot provide it. The grounds and limits for possible disclosure are determined in advance under applicable requirements and the ethics protocol. An account of an offence must not automatically be treated as triggering a duty to report it; such situations are assessed against the relevant legal and ethical grounds.

3. Documenting consent and waivers

Consent is normally documented in written or reliable electronic form. Records identify the version of the information provided, the date and method of consent, agreed uses of data and, where applicable, the person obtaining consent. Identifying forms are stored separately from research data with restricted access.

Oral consent may be used where permitted by applicable requirements and the relevant ethics determination. The protocol explains the reason and the means of recording and verification. An audio recording or a witness is not universally mandatory: their use is assessed in light of confidentiality and participant risk. A waiver of a signature or written documentation is not a waiver of consent itself.

A waiver of consent or alteration of the usual consent procedure must have a specific permissible basis and, where required, a prior decision by a competent ethics body. Authors state the body, decision date and reference number if available, its scope and justification. Inconvenience, cost, the absence of a committee at an institution, survey anonymity or public availability of data do not by themselves allow researchers to declare a waiver.

Covert observation, incomplete disclosure of the purpose or elements of deception require a specific justification of necessity, the absence of an acceptable alternative and proportionality of risk, as well as prior competent ethical assessment and the required approval. Debriefing and an opportunity to exclude data must be planned where safe and feasible; inability to provide these measures must also be justified. This procedure does not permit falsifying consent or concealing material risks outside the authorised protocol.

Example of a consent-waiver statement

Consent to participate: [Name of the competent body] authorised a waiver of consent for [specific data / procedures / group] on the grounds of [justification]; decision [reference number, if available, and date]. The safeguards provided were [brief description].

Where purposes, procedures, risks or data uses change materially, researchers assess whether a new ethics decision and renewed consent are required before implementing the changes. In prolonged or repeated contact, willingness to continue participating is confirmed as needed. Later consent does not automatically remedy an earlier failure to obtain required consent; this circumstance must be disclosed to the editors.

4. Consent for publication

Consent to participate or to process data does not automatically authorise publication of identifiable information. Publishing such material obtained from research participants requires separate explicit consent for publication unless another permissible basis is established under applicable requirements and justified to the editors.

Potentially identifiable material includes:

• photographs, video, voices and other biometric characteristics;
• individual quotations, correspondence, biographies and detailed case accounts;
• information about a victim, witness, suspect, accused or convicted person, or their relatives;
• combinations of details about location, time, position, institution, events or procedural status;
• case records, screenshots, digital traces and other information allowing direct or indirect identification.

Participants are told exactly which materials will be published, their context and their potential accessibility through the internet, search engines and further dissemination. Where possible, they are shown the relevant extract or given an equivalent understanding of its content. A choice to be named is also assessed for risks to the participant and third parties.

Consent for publication is documented and stored securely; the signed form is not published with the article. One person’s consent does not authorise disclosure of confidential information about others. Nor does it remove the duty to avoid unnecessary identification and prevent disproportionate harm.

Example of consent for publication

Consent for publication: Documented informed consent to publish the relevant [information / quotations / images / recordings] was obtained from all persons identifiable in the research materials included in the article. The content and conditions of dissemination were explained to them.

Example where no identifiable materials are included

Consent for publication: Not applicable. The article contains no research materials that allow participants to be identified.

Lawful quotation of official documents or public statements is assessed in context and is distinct from disclosure of a confidential interview. Authors justify permissibility, scientific necessity and protection of the people concerned; a source’s public availability does not remove this assessment. If the necessary consent or another permissible basis is absent, the material must be omitted or robustly anonymised without distorting the findings.

5. Privacy, confidentiality and anonymisation

Authors collect and disclose only necessary information. Without scientific necessity and an appropriate basis, they must not publish:

• names, contact details, personal identification numbers or document particulars;
• exact dates of birth, addresses, routes and locations;
• facial images, recognisable voices or distinctive physical features;
• a specific workplace, position, detention institution or combination of procedural details;
• IP addresses, device and account identifiers, geolocation or hidden metadata;
• information that could identify a participant, their relatives or other people concerned.

Removing a name, masking the eyes or slight blurring does not guarantee anonymity. Combinations of characteristics, searchability of quotations and possible linkage to external sources must be assessed. Pseudonymised data with a re-identification key are not fully anonymous.

Anonymisation must not distort the meaning or evidential basis of the research. Material transformations are described; composite or constructed examples must not be presented as an unchanged account of a real participant. Keys and consent records are protected separately, access is restricted, and retention and deletion arrangements are set in advance on an appropriate basis.

Consent to research does not provide unlimited permission to transfer data to third-party platforms, public repositories or artificial intelligence tools. Researchers examine the purposes of transfer, recipients, storage conditions, reuse and model training. Identifiable or confidential material must not be transferred without a permissible basis and sufficient safeguards.

6. Minors and vulnerable participants

Additional safeguards are determined in the particular context, including age, decision-making capacity, experience of violence, language barriers, disability, restrictions on liberty or dependency. Group membership does not by itself establish inability to consent and must not automatically exclude a person from research.

Where required, consent is obtained from a parent, guardian or other legally authorised representative. A participant able to understand the research is given an accessible explanation and asked for their own consent or an informed indication of willingness to participate — assent — appropriate to their age and decision-making capacity. Silence or lack of resistance does not replace such assent.

Refusal, signs of unwillingness to continue and a request to stop must be respected. A representative must not override a participant’s refusal simply to complete the research plan. If decision-making capacity changes or the relevant age is reached, the need to obtain the person’s own consent must be assessed.

If approaching a parent or representative could put the participant at risk, for example where that person may be involved in abuse, researchers obtain a prior decision from a competent body on a permissible safe procedure. They do not independently dispense with representative consent. Contact and information provision must be organised so as not to reveal participation to someone who poses a danger to the person.

7. Dependent relationships and undue influence

Research involving people in detention, convicted persons, people under supervision, law enforcement personnel, students, employees or recipients of assistance requires a separate assessment of their actual freedom to decide. Permission from management, an institutional administration or a supervisory authority does not replace personal consent.

Researchers must:

• explain that declining or stopping participation will not worsen legal status, conditions of detention, access to assistance to which the person is entitled, or employment or educational rights;
• not promise sentence reductions, procedural advantages or special treatment at work in exchange for consent;
• where possible, entrust recruitment and consent to a researcher independent of the person’s direct manager or supervisor;
• provide conditions in which questions and refusal are possible without the unwanted presence of a manager, custodial officer, teacher or other influential person;
• assess explicit and perceived pressure, proportionality of remuneration and safe contact arrangements;
• not disclose an individual’s participation decision to management or a supervising person without necessity and an appropriate basis.

A research interview must be clearly distinguished from interrogation, a compulsory official inquiry or an assessment used to decide a case. Participation in the programme being studied and voluntary participation in research data collection are distinguished; the programme’s own conditions are explained separately.

Compensation must be proportionate and transparent. Stopping participation must not incur penalties; payment of reimbursement already due for expenses and time spent must not depend on completing all procedures. Excessive incentives that undermine free choice must not be created.

8. Previously collected and secondary data

To reuse personal data, case records, recordings, interviews, images or digital traces, authors establish a permissible basis and check consistency with the original conditions. Depending on applicable requirements, the basis may be:

• original consent covering the specific new use;
• new consent;
• an appropriate decision by a competent ethics body, including a permissible waiver;
• another lawful and ethically justified basis with the necessary safeguards.

Ethical approval alone does not create a right to access restricted material or replace the required legal basis for processing. Permission from the data holder likewise does not remove the need to check consent restrictions and participant safeguards.

Public availability of a court document, post or dataset does not imply unlimited permission for linkage, profiling or republication. Authors consider the original context, expected confidentiality, source restrictions, re-identification possibilities and risks to third parties.

Where the proposed use exceeds the original consent, required renewed consent or a competent decision on a permissible alternative procedure is obtained before the new use. The absence of new interviews does not justify automatically declaring consent “not applicable” in research using personal data.

9. Withdrawal of consent

Before consent, participants are told how to stop participating, withdraw consent for further data use or for publication that has not yet occurred, whom to contact and what actual limitations apply. Ending future participation and excluding previously collected data are considered separately.

After irreversible anonymisation or aggregation, it may be impossible to isolate a particular person’s data. For published materials, removal of all disseminated copies cannot be promised. These limitations must be justified and explained in advance; an arbitrary deadline or publication itself does not override applicable participant rights.

Requests are considered without unjustified delay, the decision is documented, and the participant is informed of the action taken or the specific reasons for limitations. Where possible, further use is stopped and the relevant data are deleted or excluded under applicable requirements. A necessary administrative record of consent and withdrawal is retained only on an appropriate basis and with restricted access.

If identifiable material has already been published, authors promptly contact the editors. The editors assess risk, possible access restrictions, correction or other justified measures while preserving transparency of the scholarly record. Withdrawal of consent does not automatically require retraction of the article, but must not be ignored because publication has occurred.

10. Required manuscript statements

Where applicable, the manuscript must provide information on:

• ethical approval or the specific basis on which it was not required;
• obtaining consent, its form and procedure, or the basis for a waiver or other permissible arrangement;
• separate consent for publication of identifiable material or the basis for non-applicability;
• data availability, controlled access arrangements and justified restrictions;
• confidentiality, anonymisation or pseudonymisation, and significant limitations on withdrawing data.

Example of non-applicability

Informed consent: Not applicable. This work is a [theoretical / methodological] analysis and involves no research interaction with people or use of personal data.

Example for secondary data

Informed consent: Previously collected [description of data] were used. The basis for their use without new consent was [precise basis and competent body, where applicable]. Safeguards and access restrictions were [description].

These are examples, not universal declarations. Authors choose wording that reflects the facts, disclose material exceptions and ensure consistency with documents, methods and the data availability statement. The absence of names in the final article does not by itself mean that consent to participate was unnecessary.

11. Non-compliance

The editors may request evidence of consent, the participant information used, a waiver decision or a description of data safeguards. Blank templates, de-identified or redacted copies should be provided first; identifying documents are transferred only where necessary, on a permissible basis and by an agreed secure method. Signed consent forms must not be uploaded as public supplementary material or to repositories.

Failure to obtain necessary consent, falsification, inaccurate description or impermissible disclosure may result in:

• requests for explanations and supporting documents;
• requirements to correct statements or remove unnecessary identifiers;
• suspension of consideration, rejection of the manuscript or withdrawal of acceptance;
• referral to the relevant institution or competent ethics body;
• after publication, a correction, expression of concern, retraction or another proportionate measure;
• consideration under the journal’s Policy on Handling Allegations of Misconduct.

Removing identifiers or obtaining consent later does not automatically remedy misconduct in conducting the study. Measures are determined by evidence, the nature of the breach and risks to people. Authors receive a reasonable opportunity to respond; in an urgent risk situation, the editors may take justified interim protective measures before the assessment is complete.

A person with a conflict of interest must not decide the relevant case. Complaints and appeals are handled under the Complaints and Appeals Policy. Confidentiality is protected, and an author’s withdrawal from publication does not automatically end consideration of a substantiated allegation.

12. Policy administration

Following approval, this policy takes effect on the date of its publication on the official website of Criminological Activity. Actual publication and amendment dates are recorded; a new version does not retrospectively certify compliance in previously completed research.

The editorial office is responsible for implementing and reviewing the policy. The journal’s founder and publisher is the Research Institute of Criminology of the Republic of Uzbekistan. Consent matters are handled with editorial independence, confidentiality and management of conflicts of interest.

Questions and reports should be sent to the editorial office through the institute’s contact address: info@uzkti.uz. An initial message need only describe the issue and identify the manuscript or article. Sensitive data and signed forms should be sent only after agreeing on the necessary scope and a secure transfer method.

The policy is reviewed in light of applicable requirements and developments in research ethics. Reference points include the COPE Core Practices on ethical oversight and the ESRC research ethics guidance.