The Cheating Scandal

Cheating in chess is a serious problem. And a problem that simply can not be avoided, athough everyone knows that it is bad for the person doing it and the person facing it. And, while cheating is easy online and in some rated FIDE tourneys, cheating at the top OTB tournaments, like the Sinquefield Cup, is harder. If you have heard about any chess news in the past few days (or weeks by now), you know what this blog will cover. And with that, welcome!

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The Alleged Cheating Scandal of Hans Niemann

During the third round of the Sinquefield Cup in St. Louis, Hans Niemann, a 19 year old GM, and the (former) world chess champion, Magnus Carlsen, were paired up against each other. And so they did play their game on September 4th, Magnus having the white pieces and Hans playing with black. Here is the game:

And here is the engine's evaluation: Nothing too crazy, the only thing that pops into the engines evaluating eyes are the mistakes of Carlsen - and for us, the only real surprises are that Carlsen did not resign in a lost position and that he in fact lost to Hans with the white pieces. A rare occurence, and maybe even an unnatural one in all it's facettes, but not a drama yet. This, of course, was soon to change...

Let the Drama unfold...

Soon after the game, Magnus took to Twitter. There, he thanked the St. Louis Chess Club, claimed that he always had fun playing there but was to withdraw from the Sinquefield Cup. As for an explanation, he did not provide one - though a video was attached to his post, in which José Morinho, a football manager, said "If I speak I am in big trouble". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8fhccACnDY That was his explanation.
Now, while withdrawing from the tournament - which was played as a round robin, meaning every player plays every other participant - might have occured due to medical reasons, this was quickly ruled out because Magnus had no health problems. So he simply withdrew - as for the reason why, people, including popular titled players, soon started speculating that Magnus was implying that Hans cheated against him. So the chess community departed into three camps, those who think that Hans cheated and should be banned from playing, those who think that Hans is innocent and that Magnus should be punished for character assassination and then those, who are left wondering: Why? What evidence? What motive? How may it be possible? Why no further statement? And why withdraw from a round robin - a tournament that can't really function when even one player abruptly declines to play. But I digress - we will cover everything in time.

...and it keeps on growing

After this "accusation", Hans got the chance to appear in an interview. And there he spoke: He admitted to cheating in the past - once at the age of 12 and once at the age of 16. He's 19 years old now and claimed, that he lives a socially isolated life, focusing on the game and the game only in his life, this, according to Hans, is also the reason why he has had a sudden change in his accent, something noticed by lots of people. In the interview, Hans further stated that he would even go to the extremes to play chess in the tournament and over the board for this matter - in his words, he would even play stripped naked or in a box with no form of electric interference from the outside. His tone during the interview was upset, further indicating that he feels insulted by Chess.com, GM Hikaru Nakamura and, of course, Magnus Carlsen. While he did cheat on chess.com both times - even in the famous Titled Tuesday, an arena with a prize fund, Chess.com appeared to have allowed him to play in their events again - up until the point, where Magnus "accused" him, after which they - in some form or another - banned him from playing in events. And Hikaru, probably the most influential chess streamer out there, stated that he understood that Magnus thought that Hans was suspicious. So, while some GM's voiced their opinion, said that Hans was suspicious due to his past incidents, most of them also claimed that the game itself wasn't that suspicious, only Hans's interview. And most people came to the conclusion, that there wasn't enough hard, no-nonsense, evidence that spoke against Hans.

The evidence (or lack there of)

Let's look at the evidence, that speaks for cheating in this case, with some weak, often brought up, arguments and some more plausible...
Some arguments speaking for Hans's wrongdoing:
-- Hans defeated the world champion with black
-- Hans has a new accent
-- Hans has cheated before - thus, we can not trust him
-- The security measures aren't that tight - thus, Hans has been able to smuggle some sort of device into the tourney

And some that try to debunk these arguments:
-- Hans won due to Magnus's subpar mistakes in the game
-- Hans lives isolated - only focusing on chess, preparing various lines
-- Hans openly admitted to cheating in the past - besides, it was already known that he wasn't clean online
-- Though the security measures weren't all too tight, they were increased afterwards and still Hans was capable of outplaying his opponents

These are at least the arguments most often heard - probably not the best for each side, but either way: One thing is only touched on briefly - in case it is even mentioned: The actual game. I haven't noticed many people - aside from top GM's who also were kind enough to voice doubt about Hans's analysis of his own game - talk about the game and how that may factor into things. Which is somewhat ironic, since cheating only matters in games.

Thus, I tried to compare Carlsen's and Niemann's performance in the game. A disclaimer: I don't have the necessary skill to say which move is natural and which is not, to add to that I also used the Stockfish engine provided by Lichess - thus I didn't use the engine to it's fullest potential. In fact, I did not wait for every move and thus the depth per move is pretty low, but here we go anyway:

We can see, that Hans outperforms Magnus (Hans with 94% opposed to Magnus's 91% - which appears to be quite a lot on the top GM level) - that's what the result of the game shows and that is what the engine exclaims. Before hastily drawing false conclusions, we should understand: Just because the world chess champion was outperformed by - in all fairness - a strong GM, this does not mean that Hans did cheat. And, to speak the truth, it also is no evidence against it - the game, at least for me, is not hard evidence for either claim!
One thing that sticks out, however, is, that the theory ends on move 13, with Magnus Carlsen's Rook move.

So... what do we have?

A whole lot of speculation, a whole lot of drama and polarization - and little to no evidence. The truth is, at this point of time we simply can not say that Hans cheat - neither can we safely say that he is totally innocent, although it sure seems that way. Magnus on the other hand has stated absolutely nothing - no update, no word, no real accusation. In case Hans did not cheat - in that case, our former world chess champ has made a fool out of himself. And in case Hans did cheat, well in that case Magnus tried to warn us - but sadly made some questionable decisions due to his decision to not speak out loud and due to his withdrawal from a round robin. Be it that way or not, I believe that Magnus has made himself a little more unpopular with the crowds (who apparently already compare him to Fischer), and Hans also has had to suffer some character assassination - on the other hand, if he is capable of playing his cards right he gets a lot of supporting attention. Only the future will tell.

A surprising turn of events

Now, two weeks after the incident, after the interviews and tweets, there is new information to discuss. In particular, Magnus and Hans had to play against each other in a new event, the Genarations Cup. Here is the game:

Yes, you did see correctly: Magnus lost to Hans. Or rather: Magnus resigned after move one! The motivation behind this is somewhat obvious: Carlsen wants to avoid playing against Hans - but the still wants to participate in the Generations Cup. As for the reason Magnus is avoiding Hans, we are once again left to speculate: Leaked prep? Or the aforementioned cheating accusation? Numerous people now also have voiced their opinion and published their - sometimes silly, sometimes plausible and serious, theories. From Eric Hansen's "anal bead" theory (which in all fairness just was a joke mid-stream) which is now being talked about in main-media, to a theory that Hans has cheated more than twice online - at the moment, we are left to speculate. And stumbling in the dark is not healthy for the community.

And a bizarre follow up

Now, on the 21st September, Magnus finally agreed to an interview. https://youtu.be/c50PJmOj2-U?t=59 It stands out, that Magnus opened up and said he would make a "real" statement after the tourney. But the most important thing discussed, is found in and around the 1 minute and 30 second mark: "I have to say I'm very impressed by Niemann's play and I think his mentor Maxim Dlugy must be doing a great job." This alleged coach, Maxim Dlugy, is an american GM, a strong blitz player - and, apparently his account over on Chess.com is banned, though I can not confirm this ban, as for me his profile on the aforementioned chess site seems to be normal. But given that Dlugy confessed cheating in an e-mail to Danny Rensch, it's safe to say that he cheated online. Here's the Vice article with the e-mail excerpts.

And it simply does not end

On September 26th, Magnus finally released his statement on Twitter: Twitter
Here transcribed:

Dear Chess World,

At the 2022 Sinquefield Cup, I made the unprecedented professional decision to withdraw from the tournament after my round three game against Hans Niemann. A week later during the Champions Chess Tour, I resigned against Hans Niemann after playing only one move.

I know that my actions have frustrated many in the chess community. I’m frustrated. I want to play chess. I want to continue to play chess at the highest level in the best events.

I believe that cheating in chess is a big deal and an existential threat to the game. I also believe that chess organizers and all those who care about the sanctity of the game we love should seriously consider increasing security measures and methods of cheat detection for over the board chess. When Niemann was invited last minute to the 2022 Sinquefield Cup, I strongly considered withdrawing prior to the event. I ultimately chose to play.

I believe that Niemann has cheated more — and more recently — than he has publicly admitted. His over the board progress has been unusual, and throughout our game in the Sinquefield Cup I had the impression that he wasn’t tense or even fully concentrating on the game in critical positions, while outplaying me as black in a way I think only a handful of players can do. This game contributed to changing my perspective.

We must do something about cheating, and for my part going forward, I don’t want to play against people that have cheated repeatedly in the past, because I don’t know what they are capable of doing in the future.

There is more that I would like to say. Unfortunately, at this time I am limited in what I can say without explicit permission from Niemann to speak openly. So far I have only been able to speak with my actions, and those actions have stated clearly that I am not willing to play chess with Niemann. I hope that the truth on this matter comes out, whatever it may be.

Sincerely,
Magnus Carlsen – World Chess Champion

Oh well, this statement confirms what we all have thought for weeks now: Magnus is accusing Hans of cheating - and he words his accusation carefully. But: Magnus seems to lack some sort of evidence - it almost seems like he himself isn't sure wether Hans is guitly or not. And he should be, given that he accuses him for having "cheated more [...] than he has publicly admitted." So we are left to speculate once more - and we can either assume that Magnus will appear with actual evidence in the future - the normal and right thing to do if there is evidence - or we can assume that Magnus's accusation is not supported by evidence but a gut feeling - a baseless accusation so to speak.

But wait - there's more

On October 4th, Chess.com published a report about Hans Niemann's cheating history on their website. The Report is comprised of 72 pages, of which 20 pages are to be considered the main part and the other 52 pages are the appendixes, consisting of the usual appendix stuff (graphs, e-mail excerpts, tables).

Now, the report starts by explaining, that Chess.com banned Hans without pressure from Magnus's side, it also states that Hans did in fact cheat more times online and that Chess.com has evidence for these incidents. But it's also explained, that there is a lack of evidence for cheating OTB. They also express the reason behind the report, which has nothing to do with Magnus and is more of an "answer" to Hans who stated in the aforementioned interview, that Chess.com banned him.

Chess.com presents the timeline and goes on to mention the September 4th game - which in their eyes is suspicious but not an evidence for cheating. Basically, they have evidence for Hans cheating in and prior to 2020 - but not afterwards. All this cheating of course happened on Chess.com, online. Hans confessed that he cheated to Danny Rensch and was allowed to create a new account on Chess.com. The report then dives into cheat detection and how it work. They also explain, that a top player only needs to see the evaluation bar a few times in a game to succesfully cheat - but it is stated, that Chess.com does not focus on OTB shenanigans - at least not primarily. Ironically, Hans's OTB rise is then compared to the success of other young top GM's, both the strength and ELO progress is examined, though it is concluded, that the Hans's rathe unique progress wouldn't necessarily speak for cheating. Furthermore, other people's analysis on the matter is mentioned and Chess.com positions itself in a neutral way, stating that these "analyses do not meet [Chess.com's] standard".

The report concludes with Chess.com explaining that their intial private communication with Hans was never meant ot be public and that the timing of the report is bad. Also, they underline that Hans's online cheating was known to them and that he hasn't cheated since 2020, but they also appeal to OTB organizers to increase security measures for all players. To end the main part of the report, Chess.com expresses their wishes and views and claim that they just "want the best for Hans [...] [,] the best for Magnus [..] [and] the best for chess."

Shocking News

Indeed - we have new information, the Drama is still going strong a month and a half later. Hans Niemann filed a lawsuit for $100,000,000 - with the defendants being Magnus, Hikaru and Chess.com. He mainly sues them for defamation and civil conspiracy - saying (as far as I understand it) that Magnus, Nakamura and Chess.com knew that he was innocent but still went on to accuse him of cheating. And he sues them for a Million Dollars and more - now we have to wait and see... again.
Here's the lawsuit: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.moed.198608/gov.uscourts.moed.198608.1.0.pdf

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What to take away from it - for now

Well, this question was to come up sooner or later. And I think it is pretty easy. Hans, who did or did not cheat, has not been proven to cheat, in fact, STLCC claimed that the Sinquefield Cup players all followed their fair play policy. Thus, we have to treat Hans as innocent - until proven guilty, at least. Though, given Hans's past, we also need to observe him well: Because he cheated in the past, we need to be carefull - of course, this does not imply that he cheats in every game, but I think upped security measures is totally reasonable if one player admitted to violating the fair play policy of the game in the past. That's just fair, just as fair as treating him as an innocent player - untily he's found guilty, based on hard, no-nonsense facts, evidence that speaks against him. Until this evidence in brought up, we simply can not prove that he cheated.

Magnus on the other hand, in either case, be it if Hans is guilty or not, should not have handled the situation as he did: If he has any concerns, he may speak openly about it; if legal actions prohibit him to say anything, he might voice his opinion in his close circle. But, what's arguably worse than his "accusation" (you know, his tweet that actually did not actually accuse, but seemed like an accusation which kicked off people speculating, and his radio silence after this tweet), is that Magnus simply withdrew from a round robin - and you should not simply withdraw from a tournament that requires you to play against every other participant. Adding the fact that he did not have to play against Hans in the Sinquefield Cup a second time, this only adds insult to injury - compared to the Generations Cup, in which he resigned on move one, which isn't a good solution but at least a "better" solution, although it falsifies the result of the game and is not only unsportsmanlike, but also harming to the players and the game: He should have played for the win, as not playing at all at expense of rating may be considered sandbagging.

And what should we do?

I recommend, that we should all just calm down. As we have seen, we still don't have any hard evidence. For that matter, we now have Magnus Carlsen's statement - but it leaves to speculate about the whole matter and does not give any real evidence! And instead of wasting energy through being angry at Carlsen or being disappointed by Niemann, we might as well save our energy and voice our thoughts clamly and organized. We shouldn't let our emotions get the better of us, still we should be able to state our opinion on the matter - but in an appropriate, matter-of-fact tone, dominated by the fact that we simply stumble in the dark and can only judge on past actions, false or unconvincing evidence and mishandling of the whole situation. Feel free to discuss the matter in the aforementioned friendly, matter-of-fact tone in the comments of this Blog. And don't just complain about all the typos I've made! ;)

What I think about all this?

Well, I think that Magnus definitely mishandled the entire situation, whether Hans is clean or not. Magnus simply withdrawing is unsportsmanlike and in my Opinion an overreaction that served no other use than to underline his accusation. Him not playing and resigning against Hans is also something I think should be condemned: Afterall, he, the (former) world chess champion, should at least try to win - if nobody tried to win against a certain Opponent, we could just stop playing altogether, as this would simply be hand-picking our opponents. Also, the fact that his accusation, which lacks evidence, had such an impact on the community, may be counted as attempted character assassination.

I think that Hans did not cheat, but (again), I can not prove that he did not cheat nor that he did. I also think that his past cheating incidents justify further security measures held against him in the future (like him being scanned more often than others), but his past mistakes do not provide an accurate view on his current actions. If it is revealed that did in fact cheat, well, then that will be a sad turn of events; if he is proven to not have cheated, then it will be so.

Either way, I hope that he and Magnus come to terms and have a proper exchange of thoughts, though it is very likely that this won't happen - and even if it did, there's a higher change it would worsen the situation than improve the whole thing.

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The Chess speaks for itself

Or in this case the drama. Drama in the chess community isn't a rare occurence, though it usually does not grow to be that big. Afterall, there are now numerous videos and articles - even from mainstream media - covering the drama.

And you know what - this may bring people to this wonderful game, but at the same time it sheds a terrible light at those top players, whom we admire. Every chess enthusiast has the right to know what really is going on, to know if Magnus's accusation is based or if Hans is indeed totally clean.

Either way, at the moment we have almost nothing that speaks against Hans, and even if we had some hard evidence, Carlsen's behaviour is definetely questionable. But that's it, in case the drama grows even bigger, this blog will be updated. And if not, then we might as well enjoy the game and the community a little more than before.

Feel free to voice your opinion, your theories and speculation in the comments, but please express them in a civilzed manner: A friendly dicussion, dominated by a factual undertone. Thanks.
Take care!