English Chess Forum

Hmmm. I have to say I really don't care for the failure to provide explanations.

Martin,
Maybe you could post the last few games anonymously so we can see for ourselves.

[White "Opponent"] [Black "Richard James"] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "B00"] [WhiteElo "1894"] [BlackElo "1948"] [Annotator "lichess.org"] [PlyCount "99"] [EventDate "2020.??.??"] [TimeControl "300+10"] 1. e4 Nc6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 dxe4 4. d5 Ne5 $6 {(0.28 ? 0.80) Inaccuracy. Nb8 was best. B00 Nimzowitsch Defense: Scandinavian Variation, Bogoljubov Variation, Nimzowitsch Gambit} (4... Nb8 5. Nxe4 c6 6. Bc4 cxd5 7. Qxd5 Qxd5 8. Bxd5 Nd7 9. Bf4) 5. Bf4 Ng6 6. Bg3 e5 7. Nxe4 $4 {(0.37 ? -2.38) Blunder. dxe6 was best. } (7. dxe6) 7... Nf6 $4 {(-2.38 ? -0.51) Blunder. f5 was best.} (7... f5 8. Nc3 f4 9. Bd3 fxg3 10. hxg3 Nh6 11. Qe2 Bd6 12. Bb5+ Bd7 13. Nf3 Bb4 14. Nxe5) 8. Nxf6+ gxf6 9. Nf3 Bc5 $6 {(-0.52 ? 0.22) Inaccuracy. Qe7 was best.} (9... Qe7 10. Bb5+ c6 11. Ba4 h5 12. h4 Qb4+ 13. c3 Qe4+ 14. Kf1 Bd7 15. dxc6 Bxc6 16. Bxc6+) 10. Bb5+ $6 {(0.22 ? -0.45) Inaccuracy. Qd3 was best.} (10. Qd3) 10... Bd7 11. Qe2 a6 12. Bxd7+ Qxd7 13. O-O-O O-O-O 14. Qc4 Bd6 15. Rhe1 Rde8 16. h4 $6 {(-0.17 ? -0.98) Inaccuracy. Nd2 was best.} (16. Nd2 f5 17. f3 Qb5 18. Qc3 Kb8 19. a3 Rd8 20. Nc4 Rhg8 21. Bf2 f6 22. g3 Ne7) 16... f5 $4 {(-0.98 ? 0.82) Blunder. h5 was best.} (16... h5 17. Nd2) 17. h5 f4 18. hxg6 fxg3 19. gxf7 Qxf7 20. fxg3 Rhg8 21. g4 $6 {(0.90 ? 0.23) Inaccuracy. Nd2 was best.} (21. Nd2 Rxg3 ) 21... Qf4+ $4 {(0.23 ? 2.11) Blunder. h5 was best.} (21... h5 22. g5) 22. Qxf4 exf4 23. Rxe8+ Rxe8 24. Re1 Rg8 25. g5 Kd7 26. Re6 $6 {(2.05 ? 1.37) Inaccuracy. Kd2 was best.} (26. Kd2 Rg7) 26... Rg6 $2 {(1.37 ? 3.14) Mistake. c6 was best.} (26... c6 27. c4 cxd5 28. cxd5 Be7 29. Re5 Bd6 30. Rf5 Rf8 31. Ne5+ Ke8 32. Nc4 Be7 33. Rxf8+) 27. Rxg6 hxg6 28. Nh4 $4 {(2.67 ? 0.89) Blunder. Kd2 was best.} (28. Kd2 c6 29. dxc6+ bxc6 30. Kd3 a5 31. Ke4 Ke6 32. Nd4+ Kd7 33. Ne2 Ke6 34. b3 Bc7) 28... Be7 $2 {(0.89 ? 2.07) Mistake. f3 was best.} (28... f3 29. gxf3) 29. Nxg6 Bxg5 30. Ne5+ Ke7 31. Nf3 Bf6 32. c4 Kd6 33. Kc2 Kc5 34. b3 b5 35. Nd2 $4 {(2.00 ? 0.12) Blunder. Kd3 was best.} (35. Kd3 a5 36. Nd2 Kb4 37. c5 Ka3 38. d6 cxd6 39. cxd6 Kxa2 40. Ke4 f3 41. gxf3 a4) 35... bxc4 $4 {(0.12 ? 5.66) Blunder. Kd4 was best.} (35... Kd4 36. cxb5 axb5 37. a4 bxa4 38. bxa4 Be7 39. a5 Kxd5 40. Kd3 Bb4 41. Nc4 Kc6 42. a6) 36. Ne4+ Kxd5 37. Nxf6+ Ke6 $6 {(4.69 ? 6.05) Inaccuracy. Ke5 was best.} (37... Ke5 38. Ne8) 38. Nh5 cxb3+ 39. axb3 Kf5 40. Kd3 Kg4 $6 {(6.15 ? 8.82) Inaccuracy. Ke5 was best.} (40... Ke5 41. Kc4) 41. Nf6+ Kg3 42. Nd5 Kxg2 $4 {(6.95 ? Mate in 23) Checkmate is now unavoidable. a5 was best.} (42... a5 43. Kc4) 43. Nxf4+ Kf3 44. Ne6 c6 45. Nd8 c5 46. Ne6 a5 47. Kc4 Ke4 48. Nxc5+ Ke5 49. Nb7 a4 50. bxa4 {Normal Black resigns.} 1-0

lichess assessment:

Opponent +18
4 Inaccuracies
0 Mistakes
3 Blunders
32 Average centipawn loss
Richard James −7
4 Inaccuracies
2 Mistakes
5 Blunders
55 Average centipawn loss


This game was played three months ago in an internal club event on lichess (5' + 10"). My opponent (rated 1894 to my 1948 at the time) was a fellow club member, very well known for many years to me, and also to Martin, and is undoubtedly honest. Although he was rated slightly below me here he has, and has almost always had, a higher ECF rating than me.

Immediately after the game I was told my opponent had cheated and the result was reversed. I have no reason to suspect he was cheating in this game (where he made, according to the computer, three blunders), or that he would ever cheat.

Any thoughts or ideas?

Richard,
Obviously, we are not party to all the metrics here, but I would be very, very surprised if a player was banned on the basis of the moves in this games. Therefore, there would seem to be two main possibilities

1. The player was banned for something that has happened in other games and the timing in coincidental
2. The player received an automatic ban for something external to the game i.e. having an analysis board open

Given your description of events then 2 seems the most likely explanation. I hope that your friend has appealed; If this is an automatic ban, a human should be able to see that an open analysis board has not had an impact on the game, so I would hope that an appeal would be successful.

Richard James wrote: ↑

Mon Nov 23, 2020 4:28 pm

Any thoughts or ideas?

Not that wouldn't get me into trouble.

Thoughtcrime - in contemporary English usage, the word describes beliefs that are contrary to accepted norms of society.

Martin Benjamin wrote: ↑

Sun Nov 22, 2020 11:54 pm

I was very disappointed to hear from a good friend of mine that lichess had restricted his activity because of "violations" which they will not specify.

Good news, as my friend reports:

LiChess have said that they are constantly improving their cheating detection s/w, but that in my case it flagged a false positive. They have removed the restriction on my a/c and apologised for any inconvenience.

Good, i'm pleased

Martin Benjamin wrote: ↑

Tue Nov 24, 2020 10:33 pm

Martin Benjamin wrote: ↑

Sun Nov 22, 2020 11:54 pm

I was very disappointed to hear from a good friend of mine that lichess had restricted his activity because of "violations" which they will not specify.

Good news, as my friend reports:

LiChess have said that they are constantly improving their cheating detection s/w, but that in my case it flagged a false positive. They have removed the restriction on my a/c and apologised for any inconvenience.

It's good news that Lichess have admitted the error of their ways and apologised. It would be helpful to know whether this occurred as a result of an appeal to Lichess or whether their correction was not prompted by the player.

JustinHorton wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 25, 2020 7:48 am

Good, I'm pleased

How are you doing with Chess.com Round 2?

Oh, no reply. I may have another go if I can persuade mysrlf it is worth it.

John Swain wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 25, 2020 10:17 am

Martin Benjamin wrote: ↑

Tue Nov 24, 2020 10:33 pm

Martin Benjamin wrote: ↑

Sun Nov 22, 2020 11:54 pm

I was very disappointed to hear from a good friend of mine that lichess had restricted his activity because of "violations" which they will not specify.

Good news, as my friend reports:

LiChess have said that they are constantly improving their cheating detection s/w, but that in my case it flagged a false positive. They have removed the restriction on my a/c and apologised for any inconvenience.

It's good news that Lichess have admitted the error of their ways and apologised. It would be helpful to know whether this occurred as a result of an appeal to Lichess or whether their correction was not prompted by the player.

I suspect this is an automated flagging, so for instance yesterday I played a 1 minute game and was winning easily, but then fell into a trap where I couldn't avoid checkmate. I had 15 seconds left, so I tried in vain to find a way out before resigning with 8 seconds remaining. I was then issued with a warning for 'deliberately allowing my time to run out'. Presumably, had I received more of these warnings I would have suffered a flagging. However, like Martin's friend presumably it would be overturned as soon as a human has the chance to look at it.

Just had my first experience of a cheating issue on the Lichess website. I got informed that "You lost to a cheater: Refunded 6 blitz rating points." It didn't say who the supposed cheater was and It doesn't seem possible to discover that from anywhere on the website, despite it's plethora of info. on every conceivable aspect of one's play.

Neville Twitchell wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 25, 2020 12:51 pm

It didn't say who the supposed cheater was and It doesn't seem possible to discover that from anywhere on the website

I think you check back against the user names of your opponents.

Tournaments running on chess-results have the lichess user names removed after completion of the tournament. Presumably the idea being to make a process of cross-checking lichess suspensions against real names more difficult.

http://chess-results.com/tnr533546.aspx ... =7&flag=30

Roger de Coverly wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 25, 2020 1:43 pm

Neville Twitchell wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 25, 2020 12:51 pm

It didn't say who the supposed cheater was and It doesn't seem possible to discover that from anywhere on the website

I think you check back against the user names of your opponents.

Tournaments running on chess-results have the lichess user names removed after completion of the tournament. Presumably the idea being to make a process of cross-checking lichess suspensions against real names more difficult.

http://chess-results.com/tnr533546.aspx ... =7&flag=30

There’s the odd fishy one in those sections to be sure. The 70+ year olds finding the form in the online 4NCL that has eluded them for a lifetime in over the board chess.