What makes a reference credible? That it is carried out and vetted by “your” community (e.g., academia) and not by “others” (e.g., industry)? Even academic references fail to be credible, e.g., disproved after few years, redacted due to false data. In fact, academic references can also be as unverifiable (e.g., closed science, irreproducible) as industry references.

So, instead of relying on credibility (which is subjective) and focusing on false dichotomy, it is better to require the references to be available and the results in them to be verifiable.