Cheating in chess

[NickFaulks]

It mostly shows that the cheats weren't worried about being subtle/intelligent about it. Which we should broadly be happy about, I would think.

Fair enough, but I think this takes positive spin a bit too far.

All we know about intelligent cheats is that we know nothing about them.

[Ian Thompson]

The presenter didn't mention which tournament.
But 5 disqualified from the top 6 is quite scary.

Not really very scary at all It mostly shows that the cheats weren't worried about being subtle/intelligent about it.

Or perhaps not capable of being subtle or intelligent about it. If your true ability is that of a beginner, or not much better, how would you be subtle or intelligent? If, as I suspect, this is a junior tournament, at what age are children capable of being subtle and intelligent?

[Simon Rogers]

The presenter didn't mention which tournament.
But 5 disqualified from the top 6 is quite scary.

Not really very scary at all It mostly shows that the cheats weren't worried about being subtle/intelligent about it. Which we should broadly be happy about, I would think.

Any entirely 'crude' computer cheater will obviously tend to up in the top few in any tournament they enter!

Yes, I suppose that is true.
There will always be cheats who are not clever and get caught.
There are cheats who are clever and will always get away with it. Whether that is in fraud, Athletics, Cycling, Swimming or Chess.
The system will always be one step behind.

[Mick Norris]

The presenter didn't mention which tournament.
But 5 disqualified from the top 6 is quite scary.

Not really very scary at all It mostly shows that the cheats weren't worried about being subtle/intelligent about it.

Or perhaps not capable of being subtle or intelligent about it. If your true ability is that of a beginner, or not much better, how would you be subtle or intelligent? If, as I suspect, this is a junior tournament, at what age are children capable of being subtle and intelligent?

It's the UKCC, so yes a junior event; interesting question, I'd imagine Richard James would be the one to ask

[Roger de Coverly]

It's the UKCC, so yes a junior event

There's a question of how quickly, presumably with coaching, a player could improve from raw beginner to acceptable standard ( say 80-100 ECF). The allegations are that players appeared to go from raw beginner one week to playing like Carlsen the next.

[Matt Bridgeman]

It's the UKCC, so yes a junior event

There's a question of how quickly, presumably with coaching, a player could improve from raw beginner to acceptable standard ( say 80-100 ECF). The allegations are that players appeared to go from raw beginner one week to playing like Carlsen the next.

Pretty much in every age group in multiple competitions 1, 2 or more of the top ten finishers were disqualified, from the Mega Final to Giga Final and Terra Final. An interesting feature seemed to have been a number of juniors at the top end had been skating through the 4NCL for awhile with uncharacteristically strong showings, only to be finally pinged at the UK Chess Challenge.

[JustinHorton]

It mostly shows that the cheats weren't worried about being subtle/intelligent about it. Which we should broadly be happy about, I would think.

Fair enough, but I think this takes positive spin a bit too far.

All we know about intelligent cheats is that we know nothing about them.

I think this is right, and potentially important. We know, to an extent, what crude cheaters do, but do we really know anything about how smarter cheaters operate? I mean know, not speculate. We could know because of personal accounts by people who cheat or used to cheat, and we could maybe know if we had enough solid evidence derived from the analysis of games, but we don't really have anything along these lines, do we?

[Roger de Coverly]

We know, to an extent, what crude cheaters do, but do we really know anything about how smarter cheaters operate? I mean know, not speculate. We could know because of personal accounts by people who cheat or used to cheat, and we could maybe know if we had enough solid evidence derived from the analysis of games, but we don't really have anything along these lines, do we?

Over the board, three general methods have been detected, two of which are arguably crude.

One is the periodic exit to look the answer up on the phone as one of the panellists on HIGNFY put it, describing Rausis. To make that work, the cheater is likely to have to be a useful player even without advice.

The other crude method is to get advice by signalling. That may not require the cheat to be a particularly strong player, depending on the efficiency and reliability of the signalling method.

The sophisticated and possibly undetected method is where a player comes tooled up. In other words with some device hidden on his or her person which can signal moves. There are possible clues if a supposedly strong player intermittently plays like a beginner if the technology is possibly playing up or cannot be used because of a risk of detection. This may be a solo method or require a collaborator. Some of those suspected of using such approaches have self-banned before detection.

It is all relative, play under ICCF rules and every form of engine, if not human, consultation is allowed. For that matter a server could, if it wished, run a competition where external assistance was allowed. The concept of a "consultation game" is more than a century old.

[Kevin Thurlow]

The preferred method of a former junior was to visit the Analysis Room, where the father had the position running on Fritz!

[Geoff Chandler]

The match up systems that I know off only started looking for 'ffyness' after mainline theory.

Do you actually know that is true?

Hi Nick,

The only anti-cheat system I took an interest was at Red Hot Pawn.

It was disclosed that they only start looking after mainline positions. I think this is right.
The sample of games for scrutiny was 20-30. over x amount of moves.

Rating difference was also taken into consideration. Against a good player I scored a low 45%
which I found quite alarming, although I won the majority the computer thinks I stink at chess.
(these things simply do not recognise a good old fashioned Znosko-Borovsky inspired two move trap.)

When I played a much lower rated player I scored fairly high (a mild relief) because a
lot of my moves were obvious,taking loose pieces, playing forks and skewers etc.



There seems to be a lot chess scenes in adverts these days.

I was watching Poirot last night and counted three in the same break!

Included was an advert with an old man playing some wee kid at chess.
The old boy played a Knight on h3 taking a pawn on f4, smiled...and then took his move back.

This advert is encouraging cheating at chess.

[NickFaulks]

It was disclosed that they only start looking after mainline positions.

Until convinced otherwise I would guess this was no more sophisticated than ignoring the first N moves. I'm not even sure how anything better could be automated.

[Roger de Coverly]

It was disclosed that they only start looking after mainline positions. I think this is right.
The sample of games for scrutiny was 20-30. over x amount of moves.

Like Nick, there is a question in my mind about how much opening theory these detection systems actually know. For example after 1. g4 or 1. e4 c5 2. b4, many players would be making it up and might be tempted to seek assistance. In other openings, it would be possible to get well past move 10 before the game departed from well trodden paths.

[Kevin Thurlow]

"It was disclosed that they only start looking after mainline positions."

I seem to recall that Justin was understandably unhappy that they looked at positions when he was still in book, and then they claimed that he must be cheating when he just played more "book" moves.

I have played some online chess960 - I wonder if they use their alleged "anti-cheating" software on those games.

[Mick Norris]

It's the UKCC, so yes a junior event

There's a question of how quickly, presumably with coaching, a player could improve from raw beginner to acceptable standard ( say 80-100 ECF). The allegations are that players appeared to go from raw beginner one week to playing like Carlsen the next.

I don't think it is helpful to look at the extremes; the key question is whether a player can go from, say, 120 to 160 with a few months of very hard work and coaching

[Roger de Coverly]

I have played some online chess960 - I wonder if they use their alleged "anti-cheating" software on those games.

It might depend whether engines have any more of a clue about what's good and what isn't as humans. It seems noticeable that in the GM encounters that pawn play can be normal, but they spend the opening getting pieces back to squares where they know how they fit together.

Still perhaps both engine and human are essentially selecting moves in the opening with a degree of randomness. If they match, that may be better evidence of consultation than typical over the board play.