Audience: Sage ACT should follow this SOP to facilitate the anonymous manuscript review process within Synapse.

Purpose: Enable anonymous access to data in Synapse for manuscript review.

Table of Contents:

Personas

• Editor: The journal editor in charge of the submitted manuscript

• Researcher: The primary researcher who is submitting the manuscript

• Reviewers: Anonymous reviewers managed by the editor

• Sage: Employees of Sage Bionetworks

• Sage ACT: Sage Bionetworks Access and Compliance Team (act@sagebionetworks.org)

ACT Resource Links

• ACT Zone link

• Jira Governance (SG) queue link 

• LastPass link

• One Time Secret  link

• Service Account Instructions (Anonymous Reviewer Synapse Accounts) link

• Synapse Referee Accounts link

• Synapse Referee Account Google Group link

ACT Zone Tables Relevant to the Anonymous Reviewer Process

• In-Use Accounts Table: This table lists all of the reviewer accounts currently being used and should be updated anytime a new account is assigned to a review and anytime a review is completed.

• List of Active Reviewer Accounts and their Access Levels Table: This table lists all of the reviewer accounts that exist, regardless of if they are being used or not. This table should be updated when a new reviewer account is created and when a reviewer account’s access level is changed (i.e., if an account becomes certified or validated). 

• Previous Assignments of Accounts Table: This table lists previous uses of the referee accounts. This table should be updated when a review concludes. Information from the ‘In-Use Accounts’ Table should be moved to this table at the end of any review.

• List of Decommissioned Reviewer Accounts and their Access Levels Table: This table lists old accounts that should no longer be used and is only for reference.

Process Overview Steps 

1. Request to set up data access for manuscript review

2. Process acknowledgement

3. Process for assigning Anonymous Reviewer Accounts

4. How to create an Anonymous Reviewer Team & set up Reviewer account access

5. Email the anonymous reviewers login information to the editor

6. Quarterly review the status of in-use accounts

7. Account close-out

8. Decommissioning Synapse Referee Accounts

Process Details for Anonymous Review via Synapse

Step 1: Request to set up data access for manuscript review

The Community Liaison will file a Jira ticket in the Sage Governance (SG) Project utilizing the component “Anonymous Reviewer Account Request.” In the ticket description, the Community Liaison will provide the following information (or as much information available to them at that time): 

1. In the ticket description please provide the following information:

   1. Journal name

   2. Editor name and email

   3. Author name and email

   4. Manuscript Name

   5. Links to Synapse entities required for manuscript review/Syn IDs

2. Additional information that is helpful for Sage ACT. Please comment in Jira if able:

   1. Do reviewer accounts need access to the full project or just to a specific folder?

   2. Do anonymous reviewer accounts require view or download access?

   3. Do reviewers need to be certified and validated?

   4. Have the data folder(s) been shared with the ACT Team, giving the Team “Administrator” access?

   5. Number of reviewer accounts required for review

Community Liaisons are encouraged to comment the above information directly onto the Jira ticket. 

Step 2: Process Acknowledgement

Sage ACT will send an overview of the anonymous manuscript review process to the researcher, and the Researcher will reply via email with their acknowledgement. ACT will copy and paste the content of these emails directly into the Jira issue.  

Step 3: Process for Assigning Anonymous Reviewer Accounts

Sage ACT verifies whether reviewer accounts are available by checking the ACT Zone: Facilitating Anonymous Journal Reviews Wiki page.

• Compare the “List of Active Reviewer Accounts” table with the “In-Use Accounts” table to find active accounts for the journal that are not currently in use.

  • Each reviewer should be assigned their own account for the current review.

  • Ensure the accounts you use have the proper qualifications for the respective dataset (i.e. verified account, certified account, etc.).

• If all reviewer Accounts are already in use, create new reviewer accounts using the directions listed here: Setting up Anonymous Reviewer Accounts

  • If a new account is created, log the information in the “List of Active Reviewer Accounts” and ensure that the LastPass information is in the LastPass shared folder ‘Shared-Synapse-Referee-Accounts’.

  • To create a new certified reviewer account, take the certification quiz on the reviewers’ behalf. To create a new validated reviewer account, you will need to create a new dummy ORCID account and submit “test” validation docs within Synapse.

Note: Do not create a new account unless you have verified there is no existing account available to reassign.  If all reviewer Accounts are already in use, you must create a new reviewer account(s).

Please see detailed process instructions below:

Assigning an existing Account

• Check reviewer accounts in the ACT Zone and compare the “List of Active Reviewer Accounts” table with the “In-Use Accounts” table to find active account(s). 

• Assign one account to each reviewer (Each reviewer should be assigned their own account for the current review.) 

• Ensure the accounts you use have the proper qualifications for the respective dataset (i.e. verified account, certified account, etc.). Note that if all reviewer Accounts are already in use, ACT must create a new reviewer account(s).

Creating a new account

Please refer to the directions linked here on the IT Confluence  Setting up Anonymous Reviewer Accounts page.  Follow these instructions using the synapse-service@sagebase.org distribution list to create a new, unique service account for the anonymous journal review.

Steps for creating a new account:

• Refer to the Synapse Referee Accounts team page and ACT Zone tables to choose a name for the service account that has not been used yet.

• Go to Synapse.org.

• Click “Register Now”.

• On the Create Synapse Account page, create an email address using the following naming convention: 

• Click the “Send Registration Info” button.

• Open Gmail and go to Google Groups Synapse Referee Accounts in-box (link provided in Resources).

• In the in-box, open the no-reply email to the newly created email account and click on the link to create an account.

• On the Register with Synapse page enter the following information:

• Click “Next”

• Review and complete Synapse Pledge

• Click “Next”

• Click the refresh button.

• Log out of the Synapse account. 

Adding a new account to the Synapse Referee Accounts team page

After creating a new account, ACT will add the account to the Synapse Referee Accounts page which is used to track and update accounts. Please refer to the instructions for how to add member to Synapse Referee Accounts page provided below:

• You must be a Team manager to add a new Synapse referee member account.  If you are not a Team Manager, please message Team Manager to the Synapse Referee Accounts page to request to join.

• Open and log into Gmail Google Synapse Referee Accounts group, LastPass, and Synapse Referee  Accounts page.

• Once you’ve created the new anonymous reviewer Synapse account by following instructions in Setting Up Anonymous Reviewer Accounts link above, create a new entry in LastPass and enter email/username/password into the notes section.

• Log into Synapse with your personal account credentials. 

• Go to the Synapse Referee Team page and send an email invite to the new Synapse referee account email.

• Log out of Synapse and log back in using the new Synapse Referee email and password from LastPass.

• Go to Gmail Google Groups Synapse Referee Account in-box and accept the "Join" invitation for the new Synapse Referee account.  You will be automatically routed to the Synapse Referee Team page.  Verify the new account has been added.

• Log out of Synapse account, LastPass and Google Group.

Step 4: How to Create an Anonymous Reviewer Team & Set Up Reviewer Account Access

1. Go to the Teams tab in Synapse and create a new ”Reviewers” team. Ensure the manuscript name and year are included within the team name. Ensure the following options listed in a. and b. are unchecked so that users can join the team by invite-only, and add the click-wrap.

   1. “People can join this team without a team manager authorization”

   2. “Any Synapse user can send messages to this team”

   3. Add the click-wrap template to the Anonymous Reviewer Team. See template provided at bottom of Step 4. Note: The team will need to be associated with a Synapse entity before you can add the clickwrap.

2. Invite the Synapse Referee reviewers accounts to join the reviewers team.  Note:  Do not accept the click wrap on behalf of the reviewers! The reviewers need to agree to the click-wrap themselves to conduct the anonymous review.

3. Sage ACT grants each reviewer account access to the content under review in Synapse by going to the sharing settings under the entities specified by the researcher to be reviewed and adding the appropriate reviewer Team. 

4. You should select either View permissions OR Download permissions based on the researcher’s preference. 

5. Sage ACT logs the following information for each Synapse Referee Account in the “In-Use Accounts” table on the ACT Zone:  Reviewer account Name, Reviewer ProfileID, Reviewer #, Date added, Author, Synapse Project Name, Project SynID, Journal, Access level, Account Type.

Add the following click-wrap to the Anonymous Reviewer Team: 

####**Before conducting the manuscript review, please agree to the following terms and conditions for anonymous data access:**

**You agree to only access and use the data necessary for the purpose of reviewing the submitted manuscript, and to delete any data downloaded immediately after submitting your review if applicable.**

• You agree to abide by the Synapse [Terms of Use](https://s3.amazonaws.com/static.synapse.org/governance/SageBionetworksSynapseTermsandConditionsofUse.pdf?v=4) and [Privacy Policy](https://s3.amazonaws.com/static.synapse.org/governance/SynapsePrivacyPolicy.pdf?v=5).

• You confirm that you will not attempt to re-identify research participants for any reason, including for re-identification theory research.

• You will not reset your account username or password. If you have issues logging into the account, please inform the Journal Editor.  

• You agree to report any misuse or data release, intentional or inadvertent, to the Journal Editor within 2 business days of initial knowledge.

Step 5: Email the Anonymous Reviewer’s log-in information to the Editor

Instructions for ACT: The purpose of this email template is to relay Synapse anonymous reviewer account information to the journal editor.

• The Sage ACT will use [One Time Secret  link] to generate a secret password for each anonymous reviewer account by copying the Synapse login credentials from LastPass Shared Synapse Referee Account ( username, email and password), generating a secret password and then copying the secret password into the template.  

• Using the template, insert the manuscript name, author, link to Synapse entities and One Time Secret password link for each anonymous reviewer and email it to the editor. Each reviewer should be sent One Time Secret log-in credentials for one of the anonymous accounts.

• ACT updates the Jira to indicate which Synapse Referee Accounts have been assigned for the review. Note: Do not put login credentials for the anonymous reviewer accounts in the Jira.

Email this template to the editor:

Step 6: Quarterly Review the Status of In-Use Accounts

1. ACT emails Author for updates on the status of their manuscript review.

2. If Author requests an extension, ACT will update the ACT Zone “In-Use Table” and maintain reviewer’s access.

3. If Author needs to provide access to new reviewers, follow the process in Step 3 to assign reviewer accounts and extend access to all in-use reviewers.

4. If review is complete or manuscripts needs to be submitted to a new journal, ACT will revoke access to assigned reviewers and will reassign reviewers accounts to the new journal.

5. Remove anonymous reviewer account access after 6 months if the Author hasn’t responded to requests for updates (Refer to Step 7: Account Close-Out).

Step 7: Account Close-Out

1. Once the review is concluded, Sage ACT should revoke anonymous account access by un-sharing any projects or folders with the reviewer team associated with the manuscript by going to the related entities and deleting the Reviewer Team from the project sharing settings. Note: At the researcher’s request, anonymous reviewer data access may be extended an additional 6 months. ACT will note the extension in the Jira issue and document the extension in the In-Use table in the ACT Zone.

2. Sage ACT will reset all reviewer account passwords by:

   1. Logging into the anonymous reviewer's Synapse account and changing the password. Log into the accounts and double check that you can no longer access the data.

   2. Update the new account password in LastPass under Shared-Synapse-Referee-Accounts in the Notes section. 

   3. Note: ACT Members will need to be invited to this Note in order to have access to passwords and update passwords. This does not apply to the Gmail Google Group account that is tied to the Synapse account.

3. Sage ACT will update the ACT Zone by moving the information from the “In-Use Accounts” table to the “Previous Assignments of Accounts” table.

4. Sage ACT will comment on Jira when the account close-out process has been completed, update the JIRA ticket with the date of account closure and resolve the Jira ticket.

Step 8: Decommissioning Synapse Referee Accounts

1. Check the ACT Zone In-Use Accounts Table to ensure the account isn’t currently being used. If the account is listed in the Previous Assignment of Accounts table, then the account close-out process has been completed and Sage ACT can proceed with the decommissioning process.

2. Move the account to the Closed Accounts Pending Decommission table.

3. Refer to the IT Confluence Anonymous Reviewer Synapse Accounts instructions, step #7.

4. Open a Jira issue under the IT project and request removal of the Synapse account. Provide the user Profile ID and email address.

5. Once IT has confirmed removal of the account:

   1. Move the account information to the List of Decommissioned Reviewer Accounts and their Access Levels table.

   2. Delete the account information in LastPass.

   3. Delete the account from the Synapse Referee Accounts page.