Cheating in chess

[Roger de Coverly]

If not, is highly suspicious behaviour enough to convict him?

Unless as in the case of Rausis, someone pokes their head over the door, evidence against the "phone in toilet" method is always liekly to be circumstancial. Arguably though it's a lot more solid than an assertion that you aren't good enough to play the moves you played, which is the engine matching approach.

Also if there was a phone concealed in the toilet that suggests someone in the tournament would have placed it there in order to attempt to use it. So someone is guilty of attempted cheating.

[LawrenceCooper]

FIDE Fair Play Commission statement: https://www.fide.com/news/3266

I haven't seen anything saying whether or not either of the two mobile phones found have been proven to be Shevchenko's. If not, is highly suspicious behaviour enough to convict him?

I hadn't seen any mention of him being convicted. The last paragraph seemed quite clear: "It is of paramount importance to highlight that “Such a provisional suspension, however, would not indicate that GM Shevchenko is guilty of a cheating offense. This needs to be carefully investigated on the assumption that the player is innocent.” To this effect, an Investigatory Panel chaired by Vincent Geeraets has been appointed."

[Ian Thompson]

Also if there was a phone concealed in the toilet that suggests someone in the tournament would have placed it there in order to attempt to use it. So someone is guilty of attempted cheating.

Under what rule? As far as I can see "going equipped to cheat" is not against the rules, so long as you don't have a mobile phone on your person. Only actual cheating is against the rules. If someone conceals a mobile phone in the toilets so they can consult it if they decide they want to they haven't broken any rules if they never do consult it. Perhaps the rules need changing.

[Tim Spanton]

Also if there was a phone concealed in the toilet that suggests someone in the tournament would have placed it there in order to attempt to use it. So someone is guilty of attempted cheating.

Under what rule? As far as I can see "going equipped to cheat" is not against the rules, so long as you don't have a mobile phone on your person. Only actual cheating is against the rules. If someone conceals a mobile phone in the toilets so they can consult it if they decide they want to they haven't broken any rules if they never do consult it. Perhaps the rules need changing.

Surely they could be dealt with under the catch-all bringing-the-game-into-disrepute?

[Roger de Coverly]

Unsurprisingly the story is spreading to the tabloid press.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/sport/31150185 ... hevchenko/

The management of the team he was playing for have dumped him.

[Roger de Coverly]

This is a story that seems to have escaped notice on the forum
https://www.chess.com/news/view/2024-pl ... icago-open

A player was caught red-handed at the Chicago Open 2024, using a phone to win chess games over the board. Unlike other offline cheating cases, the player didn't use a device outside the playing hall; instead, he used his phone in his lap, right at the chessboard. He gained over 1,000 rating points in the last year before he was caught.

It seems amazing that a player could repeatedly get away with consulting a phone during a game whilst seated at the board. Surely someone would notice or look over his shoulder.

The USCF has its own sometimes bizarre rules, but surely having an active phone and consulting it during the game would be banned even if no chess software was involved.

[Ian Thompson]

It seems amazing that a player could repeatedly get away with consulting a phone during a game whilst seated at the board. Surely someone would notice or look over his shoulder.

It depends how he was consulting it. Here's another example of a player using a phone at the board where use of an earpiece as well meant he didn't need to look at the phone to get the suggested moves. It doesn't say how the moves played in the game were input to the engine though.

[Roger de Coverly]

It doesn't say how the moves played in the game were input to the engine though.

I suppose the normal blind player's board could have been modified to operate as a sensory chess board.

[Mick Norris]

David Smerdon

People are not much better than a coin flip at guessing if their opponent is cheating in a chess game. That's what grandmaster and economics researcher David Smerdon concluded after running two experiments to test people's ability to spot cheaters.

According to the results, stronger players do have a better chance of catching cheaters. However, chess experience, defined by how long a player has been playing chess, is what makes the most difference. Still, even players with more than 10 years of experience only had a 58% success rate. Caruana, who took the test, scored 3 out of 7.

[Ian Thompson]

David Smerdon

Smerdon said about correctly assessing whether another player is cheating. "I think it's much harder than people recognize. And there are a few players, very strong players, who overestimate their ability to a significant degree."

I wonder if he had anyone in particular in mind?

[Paul Cooksey]

I can't match Smerdon's academic rigour. But I have watched two season of The Traitors. It teaches us that not only are we really bad at spotting deception, but also that we do not want to admit we are really bad at spotting deception.

For variety here is an unusual type of skulduggery: https://x.com/i/status/1853514195490288116 Is it wrong that I was impressed?

[Chris Rice]

Interesting 24 minute video here where poker and chess cheating intersect. The first 19 minutes is about a poker player that has been cheating for years and finally confessed. However, the confession clearly wasn't sincere as he went on to cheat again and again. The final five minutes is where the poker player decided to try online chess again clocking up an impressive 95% accuracy rating in a match series against Chris Brewer. The video concludes with a challenge for the poker player to play a match against a decent chess player face to face and see whether he can beat him and achieve a 92% accuracy rating at the same time. If he does he'll win $100,000.

[Jon Mahony]

Interesting 24 minute video here where poker and chess cheating intersect. The first 19 minutes is about a poker player that has been cheating for years and finally confessed. However, the confession clearly wasn't sincere as he went on to cheat again and again. The final five minutes is where the poker player decided to try online chess again clocking up an impressive 95% accuracy rating in a match series against Chris Brewer. The video concludes with a challenge for the poker player to play a match against a decent chess player face to face and see whether he can beat him and achieve a 92% accuracy rating at the same time. If he does he'll win $100,000.

Yeah, I gave up playing poker online - even at the low stakes cash tables you get the constant feeling that 3 people sitting down are bots (perfect play on 20 or so tables at once). Some people will use this as an excuse for been a loosing player, but I think the suspicions are justified in 2024 - I think to carry on people need to move away from Holdem and start popularising some of the mixed games (sadly I can't get my head round many of those - still waiting for 7 card stud to make a comeback as I crush in that ). Now I just spend an evening playing a 1/2 game at the casino if I get the itch, the poker gravy train of like 10 years ago when there were still a lot of soft games has pretty much dried up.

[Joey Stewart]

Interesting 24 minute video here where poker and chess cheating intersect. The first 19 minutes is about a poker player that has been cheating for years and finally confessed. However, the confession clearly wasn't sincere as he went on to cheat again and again. The final five minutes is where the poker player decided to try online chess again clocking up an impressive 95% accuracy rating in a match series against Chris Brewer. The video concludes with a challenge for the poker player to play a match against a decent chess player face to face and see whether he can beat him and achieve a 92% accuracy rating at the same time. If he does he'll win $100,000.

95% is definitely suspect but it can depend on the game played to an extent - if you swap a lot of pieces off early and don't totally botch up the resulting position it is quite possible to get very high accuracy, especially if you end up in a long endgame where the engine will agree with just about any move you make that isn't an outright blunder. If it's a more messy position then chances are that humans are only going to be scoring 70-80% at best because they will be missing a ton of tactics - I imagine it was more likely the latter sort of game if the guy is willing to bet £100k on it being impossible to reproduce.

Also, poker cheating isn't just the players, it is the casinos using plants too, which they likely have been doing since the game was first invented

[Ian Thompson]

I imagine it was more likely the latter sort of game if the guy is willing to bet £100k on it being impossible to reproduce.

Did you watch the video? I was left with the impression that the presenter has little understanding of chess, ratings or accuracy. His argument was that if the world champion can only manage 92% accuracy anyone who exceeds that must be cheating. I doubt he would realise that accuracy is dependent on the complexity of the position. He made no mention of the most obvious anomaly - the poker player had a chess.com rating in the 1500s prior to playing the games in question, although he did point out that the player's accuracy had jumped by about 20% in his most recent games.