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Chess Investigation Finds U.S. Grandmaster ‘Likely Cheated’ More Than 100 Times

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Re: Chess Investigation Finds U.S. Grandmaster ‘Likely Cheated’ More Than 100 Times

#251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally, I'm not a fan of permanent Scarlet Letters for .... I think I may go so far as to say anything .

> Personally, I'm not a fan of permanent Scarlet Letters for .... I think I may go so far as to say anything . What's your opinion of the National Sex Offender Registry?

There are several good arguments put forward by criminologists, legal scholars, and other researchers which argue that the registry is ineffective at best and unjust at worst.

Not to take away from the point you are making, but this is simply not a good example of an uncontroversial case of scarlet lettering.

Re: Chess Investigation Finds U.S. Grandmaster ‘Likely Cheated’ More Than 100 Times

#252
post #49
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right? I completely didn't understand this part? In pretty much everything else, you cheat, you're basically done.

I'm not a fan of this player, I don't even play chess. Still it sounds a bit harsh to me that a child that cheated online can never in his adult life participate in chess tournaments. If he had cheated as an adult I would have a different opinion.

He's still a child. He cheated when he was 16 (now we have evidence that he cheated at 17 too), and he's only 19. I don't think a 5 year ban (or honestly, even a 10 year ban) is all that extreme.

Re: Chess Investigation Finds U.S. Grandmaster ‘Likely Cheated’ More Than 100 Times

#253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if he was cheating, its a dumb move to do that. It's super easy to stop websites from knowing that you're switching tabs or windows. https://github.com/IceWreck/Page-Visibility-User-Script I made this a while ago. Or just use another computer.

yeah exactly. if you're cheating online at a high-level, would this not be the exact first thing you'd think about dealing with? chess.com can have all the crazy algorithms in the world to try and figure out if you're playing like a human, but if you're tabbing out every time your opponent plays a move, you're giving the game away in move 1 (or - to take a more literal approach - whatever move takes you out of your o…

Well, if you are just 16 you are bound to make some slip-ups like this due to having an incomplete idea of the possible "attack" surface that the defender can use (to accuse you of cheating).

Re: Chess Investigation Finds U.S. Grandmaster ‘Likely Cheated’ More Than 100 Times

#254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One time when they were 17. Obviously the sanction at 12 wasn't bad enough. A barring for 5 years would've maybe helped him learn his lesson

Whatever happened during online play on a second rate chess site is hardly a reason to ban player from OTB events without evidence of cheating in such events.

chess.com is a first rate entity in the chess world (a peer of FIDE and lichess), and Hans was caught cheating in events that had cash prizes. Hans cheated for money, that's plenty of indication that he would cheat in more important situations as well.

Re: Chess Investigation Finds U.S. Grandmaster ‘Likely Cheated’ More Than 100 Times

#255
post #248

Noob here: how did he cheat without getting caught? did he memorize chess engine responses? Or did he have a secret computer somewhere feeding him the moves?

Memorizing is not cheating. Many of the pros do that. He'd need to be receiving computer analysis during the game for it to be cheating.

Re: Chess Investigation Finds U.S. Grandmaster ‘Likely Cheated’ More Than 100 Times

#256

It's a real red flag that he plays stronger moves after the browser window loses focus. I'd argue that's much less circumstantial than anything else so far.

Even if he was cheating, its a dumb move to do that. It's super easy to stop websites from knowing that you're switching tabs or windows. https://github.com/IceWreck/Page-Visibility-User-Script I made this a while ago. Or just use another computer.

He's a chess prodigy not a computer nerd. It probably never even occurred to him that chess.com was tracking page focus to get a sense of cheating.

Re: Chess Investigation Finds U.S. Grandmaster ‘Likely Cheated’ More Than 100 Times

#257
post #19

The next 'move' for cheaters is to use chess computers in a way that passes 'Chess Turing Test' and makes cheating indistinguishable from normal human play under analysis. When there is money in the game, there is incentive to cheat. > The report says dozens of grandmasters have been caught cheating on the website, including four of the top-100 players in the world who confessed. There are probably smart cheaters alr…

> The next 'move' for cheaters is to use chess computers in a way that passes 'Chess Turing Test' and makes cheating indistinguishable from normal human play under analysis.

If it's indistinguishable from human play, then there is no advantage to cheating with a chess engine. The point of cheating is that the chess engine is stronger than human play and will give you mistake-free moves that put you in winning positions. If all your moves are equivalent to human moves, then you're playing no better than a human, at whatever level that is, let's assume GM 2700-2900. So what advantage does a human GM get from doing that?

Re: Chess Investigation Finds U.S. Grandmaster ‘Likely Cheated’ More Than 100 Times

#258
post #28

Just to make sure I read this right: he most likely cheated in 11 online tournaments from 2015 - 2020. Why not analyze his recent and over-the-board games?

Kenneth Regan did that and came to a conclusion that there were no cheating.

Which is odd, considering how many games Hans played at 90-100% match for chess engine moves, which seems to be a lot more than other GMs, where typically their best games are in the 70% range. See Hikaru and other chess YT channels.

Re: Chess Investigation Finds U.S. Grandmaster ‘Likely Cheated’ More Than 100 Times

#259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel that the raison d'etre of morality is in the promotion of healthy relations and prosperous communities, and my policy intuition tells me that punishing over half of a population is probably the wrong move.

The thing is, it's only half the population now . Once you set the precedent, it won't be half the population any more. You can also just slowly ratchet up the pressure, cutting off the cheating over time.

This is the same logic as roman decimation, which I think you'll find few people arguing is a great way to run a military today.

Re: Chess Investigation Finds U.S. Grandmaster ‘Likely Cheated’ More Than 100 Times

#260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There will always be cheaters when money is involved. The Saudi route of death penalty is probably too high. It’s better to just invest money into anti cheat architecture.

Why not both? Particularly in a game or a sport, where losing access to the competitive scene doesn't really negatively impact your life. Like it or not, there aren't very many robbers in Saudi Arabia - they get their hands cut off.

> Like it or not, there aren't very many robbers in Saudi Arabia - they get their hands cut off.

Is this actually the case or it is apocryphal? A quick google tells me that thefts make up 47% of all total reported crimes in Saudia Arabia in 2002 [1]. That seems like the opposite of "aren't very many", especially when compared to Canada, whose number appear to be 28% in 2020 [2]. (Just the numbers I could find - I'm sure there's reporting issues at play here.)

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_Saudi_Arabia#Theft

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_Canada#Crime_statisti...

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