cheating on chess.com

I take offense to that. Are you implying that using a computer would make me dumber?

What makes sense, and is fair, is to disqualify mandelshtam from any tournaments in which he unfairly profited from using a computer. I'm sure that chess.com staff has thought through the sanction problem and is a fair and unbiased bunch of admins.

No I don't think it is.

I do really think chess.com needs to take a hard stance on cheating in order to get a step closer to stamping it out. By creating his account he agreed to the terms and conditions (whether he read them or not), and by not abiding by them he should expect to get banned. Cheating takes up a lot of the staff's time trying to stop it on sites like this. I don't think ignorance should be an excuse. If eric let's him slip through the cracks, he'd have to let everyone else too lazy to read the rules slip through the cracks also when they break them.

i also belive that his acc should be erased, but that doesn't stop him to make a new one and start again i mean what really matter its to play good chess games and i also think it would be a waste to lose a player like him since even with out a chess enginee he's a strong player

atomicchicken: good luck being such a hard liner when you create your own website.

gumpty: right. :-)

Actually if I ever show up on the candidate cheater list, I'm 100% sure that any investigations will completely exonerate me, on account of my numerous inaccuracies and sometimes outright blunders in turn-based, in live chess quick and blitz.

But I am proud of my 1000th Quick victory. Thing is, in order to be good at quick, you've got to be capable of winning on the board and on the clock. It's a difficult task.

So explain to me why taking a tough stance on cheating is so hard to manage?

I think the simplest way to find whether a person is cheating is to observe the playing style, not his score. I think the playing style of a human and that of a computer will be vastly different. A computer will decide on moves based on material and positional evaluation - thus basically it cannot think of traps, strategy, sacrifices (unless it gives immediate tangible gain) etc. A computer cannot scheme traps like Lasker, Morphy. Human players give sometimes weak psychological moves so that if the opponent gives the obvious response, he/she loses. I can bet no computer will come up with the Lasker Trap! The computer will never suggest weak moves with the hope the opponent will fall into a trap!

My view is that in the world of cheaters the number that know exactly what they are doing vastly outnumber the ignorant types, such as mandelshtam in this case.

If it were up to me, I'd find a way to automate the process, having less direct human involvement. I wonder if there's an interesting way of publicing the audit process. I'm thinking out loud here:

Let's say that if you go 20 moves without making any inaccuracies or blunders that you are "up for audit". Then, some member of the staff talks to you a bit about why you did this move, or that move, or whatever. If you pass, you get a gold star. If these gold stars were public, it would be like a badge of honor, to have gone through what amounts almost to a pseudo-lesson.

This is why it always amuses me somewhat to hear a low to medium rated player accused of cheating.  I was in live chess the other day and the accusation was levied against a player rated around 1300.  In addition to refusing to accept that if the accused were a cheater they would likely not be rated as low as 1300, the accuser couldn't seem to grasp that almost any cheating players would likely be so far out of their league, ratings wise, that they'd be unlikely to be matched up against them in the first place.

I seriously doubt that I've faced any cheaters here for this reason.

dsarkar: Your idea is excellent, and it would be even more excellent if there were a method for determining how "computer-like" or "human-like" a series of moves are, without human intervention.

why do you care? when whoever it is goes to an otb tourney or a coffee house then the world will know. If he or she wants to be a net sensation liar (if they are cheating) let them... Do your best for you. i'm sure everyone that owns a chess engine and uses this site is tempted but if you're real with yourself and chess you'll take your lumps the old fashoined way and let patience and study prevail.

I suspect I have played against more than one cheater on the site, but I can confirm for sure that I have played against one confirmed cheater.

But if it was the case that being ignorant when cheating is concerned is OK, then if any user was consulted about the matter by the staff they could just say I wasn't aware using an engine was cheating and get away with it. Doesn't sound like the best way to run a site in my opinion.

The last paragraph is an interesting idea, which should I think be put to use if someone is reported as possibly cheating.

atomicchicken: cheaters who are not ignorant initially deny it. Then they maybe say that their "friend" sometimes plays on their account, so it's not their fault. Then maybe they eventually get around to saying that they did in fact use an engine, but that they didn't know it was against the rules.

But I agree that one wouldn't want to be so lenient as to encourage players to use an engine "one time". I wonder if there's a clear way to determine whether a user is aware of such issues. For example, you are, and I am. Maybe someone in live chess who tells the whole world XYZ is a cheater! also knows about the rule. This might be a difficult problem, but is it really much more difficult than determining how "computer-like" a move or sequence of moves is?

i don't agree with cheating but alot of you are making comments like this is some sanctioned site. This is chess.com not the US Federation of Chess.com if you catch my drift... If FIDE or USCF had this type of site then cheaters beware but chess.com doesn't command that respect as of yet.

This is like a mixture of myspace and yahoo chess.

I don't think whether chess.com is officially sanctioned in some manner or not is really relevant.  What is at stake is the ability for users to trust that they are here on a level playing field and to derive enjoyment out of using this site as a result.  If cheating were rampant here then I suspect that interest from most users would quickly wane.  For this reason, taking a strict stance against cheating is just good business for chess.com -- sanctioned or not.