Algorithms vs The Human side.
A few days ago, someone I know in my hometown was flagged as a "cheater" on lichess. At present Lichess prefers the eufemistic flagging "This account violated the Lichess Terms of Service".
I'm perfectly aware that there have been many cases of people on line who dispute Lichess decissions, some were honest, some where not, and until recently, I always had my doubts about those cases. I have very little doubts about this one!
Santiago Palomar is a fiftysomething public servant who has a passion in life: his chess. He's been a formidable chess player for over 40 years. Those of us who know him in our hometown know that he'd never do anything to dishonor chess. Never EVER. He'd rather be eaten alive by hungry sharks! Seriously, he would...
The flagging, which in my opinion is completely unfair and unfounded, has caused him great pain and distress because it's so un fair...
He doesn't like computers and until recently he didn't even know how to play on-line. I teach at a local club and even had to convince him to join lichess!
He appealed lichess decision, but this was the answer:
"We are continuously improving our cheat detection so that we canaggressively prevent cheating while minimizing the false positives.
After investigating your case, we have determined that our cheatdetection algorithms flagged your account with sufficient evidence forthe mark to remain.
Lichess has strong detection methods and a very thorough process for reviewing all the evidence and making a decision. The process sometimes involves many moderators and can take a long time. Other
than the mark itself, we will not go into details about evidence orthe decision making process for individual cases. It is a strictLichess policy to not discuss the specifics of cheat detection publicly with anyone ever, doing so would make it easier for cheatersto avoid detection and be an invitation to many unproductive debates.
Any attempts to start such a debate will be ignored."
Santiago Palamor's local rating has been higher than 2200 at some point.
Hi FIDE rating has been as hight as 2130.
His current FIDE rating is around 1955.
You can view it here:
ratings.fide.com/id.phtml?event=2254956
His Lichess rating is 1902 (lower than both his FIDE and local ratings!). Check it out here:
lichess.org/@/Santiago2008/all
So, what are the facts? Out of his recent games, 2 of them had a centipawn loss of less than 20, just about every other one is higher.
This is the first one: (Yes, nice combination at the end giving up the knight, but, frankly, not too difficult. I've seen him do much harder puzzles in our class! )
Thes following game, which was apparently used by lichess also, was played against Jorge Struch, who happens to be a team mate of his and a very good friend also, and Jorge knows that Santi can still play some wonderful attacking games, so he wasn't at all shocked to lose a quick game against him. This is the game:
So, apparently these were the 2 main games with a centipawn loss of less than 20 (just about every single one of the others has a centipawn loss of +40, most a lot more) which the algorithms used as main proof of his cheating, and one of them played against a great friend of his who would never accuse him of such a thing because he knows how good he is at chess after more than 40 years..., and the other, a relatively simple combination in a clearly better position.
And all of that alleged cheating just for what?? just to gain a few rating points?? hasn't he proven that he doesn't care about rating?? he's played over 700 games on-line for god's sake!! if he wanted to cheat his rating would have gone up ages ago!
I'm sure he has lost many on time because I've seen him play on a phone which he can barely use, and both his FIDE and local ratings are higher, which very few people can say on lichess...
I support lichess, I think it's, by far, the best online chess platform ever, I've been supporting lichess for quite a while now and will continue to do so, but guys, we're humans, the accusation here makes no sense whatsoever.
We are humans, we can and we do nasty things all the time. But Lichess, YOU GOT THIS ONE WRONG. This guy loves chess and would never do anything to harm the integrity of our sport. And as Santi says: "you know, we may not be high rated players, but we can play a brilliant game from time to time.
I can assure you that he can. Check out your database if you don't believe me... look up "Santiago Palomar" if you don't believe me!.
A few days ago, someone I know in my hometown was flagged as a "cheater" on lichess. At present Lichess prefers the eufemistic flagging "This account violated the Lichess Terms of Service".
I'm perfectly aware that there have been many cases of people on line who dispute Lichess decissions, some were honest, some where not, and until recently, I always had my doubts about those cases. I have very little doubts about this one!
Santiago Palomar is a fiftysomething public servant who has a passion in life: his chess. He's been a formidable chess player for over 40 years. Those of us who know him in our hometown know that he'd never do anything to dishonor chess. Never EVER. He'd rather be eaten alive by hungry sharks! Seriously, he would...
The flagging, which in my opinion is completely unfair and unfounded, has caused him great pain and distress because it's so un fair...
He doesn't like computers and until recently he didn't even know how to play on-line. I teach at a local club and even had to convince him to join lichess!
He appealed lichess decision, but this was the answer:
"We are continuously improving our cheat detection so that we canaggressively prevent cheating while minimizing the false positives.
After investigating your case, we have determined that our cheatdetection algorithms flagged your account with sufficient evidence forthe mark to remain.
Lichess has strong detection methods and a very thorough process for reviewing all the evidence and making a decision. The process sometimes involves many moderators and can take a long time. Other
than the mark itself, we will not go into details about evidence orthe decision making process for individual cases. It is a strictLichess policy to not discuss the specifics of cheat detection publicly with anyone ever, doing so would make it easier for cheatersto avoid detection and be an invitation to many unproductive debates.
Any attempts to start such a debate will be ignored."
Santiago Palamor's local rating has been higher than 2200 at some point.
Hi FIDE rating has been as hight as 2130.
His current FIDE rating is around 1955.
You can view it here:
ratings.fide.com/id.phtml?event=2254956
His Lichess rating is 1902 (lower than both his FIDE and local ratings!). Check it out here:
lichess.org/@/Santiago2008/all
So, what are the facts? Out of his recent games, 2 of them had a centipawn loss of less than 20, just about every other one is higher.
This is the first one: (Yes, nice combination at the end giving up the knight, but, frankly, not too difficult. I've seen him do much harder puzzles in our class! )
Thes following game, which was apparently used by lichess also, was played against Jorge Struch, who happens to be a team mate of his and a very good friend also, and Jorge knows that Santi can still play some wonderful attacking games, so he wasn't at all shocked to lose a quick game against him. This is the game:
So, apparently these were the 2 main games with a centipawn loss of less than 20 (just about every single one of the others has a centipawn loss of +40, most a lot more) which the algorithms used as main proof of his cheating, and one of them played against a great friend of his who would never accuse him of such a thing because he knows how good he is at chess after more than 40 years..., and the other, a relatively simple combination in a clearly better position.
And all of that alleged cheating just for what?? just to gain a few rating points?? hasn't he proven that he doesn't care about rating?? he's played over 700 games on-line for god's sake!! if he wanted to cheat his rating would have gone up ages ago!
I'm sure he has lost many on time because I've seen him play on a phone which he can barely use, and both his FIDE and local ratings are higher, which very few people can say on lichess...
I support lichess, I think it's, by far, the best online chess platform ever, I've been supporting lichess for quite a while now and will continue to do so, but guys, we're humans, the accusation here makes no sense whatsoever.
We are humans, we can and we do nasty things all the time. But Lichess, YOU GOT THIS ONE WRONG. This guy loves chess and would never do anything to harm the integrity of our sport. And as Santi says: "you know, we may not be high rated players, but we can play a brilliant game from time to time.
I can assure you that he can. Check out your database if you don't believe me... look up "Santiago Palomar" if you don't believe me!.
