Sometimes a story can blow up in an unexpected way. About a month ago, Hans Niemann was accused of cheating during a chess match through ludicrous means. A Reddit joke that went too far claimed Neimann was using anal beads as a method of cheating. Specific buzzes for specific moves, etc.. Which turned out to be rather blown out of proportion. But, we knew there was something more substantive to this case. Turns out, we were right.
Niemann’s rise to the upper echelons of the chess world were already a bit odd to some. It culminated in a tournament last month when Niemann beat the world champion chess master, Magnus Carlsen. This wouldn’t normally make too many waves, except for the fact that Carlsen removed himself from the tournament after losing; something that hasn’t been done by a grandmaster in at least 50 years. Something had to be going on with Carlsen to make him do this. At the time, it seemed that Carlsen was trying to insinuate that Niemann was cheating, but without directly making an accusation. But if that was just a small statement he made a bigger one several days later when he quit a match after only one move against Niemann.
After something like this, Carlsen could only stay quiet for so long. On September 26th, Carlsen made the move to officially say that he felt Niemann was cheating.
Niemann has denied he was cheating. He did admit that he cheated twice in online games on Chess.com though at the ages of 12 and 17. He claimed he had not cheated “in actual, physical matches,” nor innever games that involved prize money. Naturally the question arose in the minds of many. Is this all the cheating he’s ever done? As it turns out, probably not. In fact, he may have cheated over 100 times.
Chess.com began an investigation into previous games that Niemann had played before he was banned from the site for cheating. Analysis from The Wall Street Journal indicates Niemann may have cheated so much, his rise in chess playing level would surpass even that of Bobby Fischer. There always exists the possibility for someone to just be an intensely skilled prodigy, but when you account for other factors, it’s not nearly as likely.
Chess.com began reviewing previous games that Niemann played and found numerous anomalies such as opening up other windows on a computer while playing. This could indicate Niemann was consulting a chess simulator to provide moves. Additionally, there are times where Niemann could play the exact same moves a computer would perform with little to no hesitation. As you can imagine if you’re legitimately playing Chess on a master level, against another master, these moves are not so quickly made.
Suffice to say, this is not exactly the kind of publicity that the chess world wanted brought down on themselves. The adage about any publicity being good publicity doesn’t always hold true when it exposes long lasting or ignored problems. As for what happens from here; who knows? It’s harder to prove that Niemann would be cheating in an actual, physical match, but not impossible. Just because that joke about the anal beads was ridiculous doesn’t mean that cheating of some kind isn’t taking place in another way. Then there’s the possibility that he’s not cheating at all in physical matches.
The saga of Magnus Carlsen vs. Hans Niemann is far from over and likely won’t end in a stalemate. Perhaps the bigger issue at large is how no matter who ultimately wins this game, the game of Chess winds up losing a great deal. Perhaps this is why Chess.com didn’t really do much digging around before all this broke out; you can’t find problems if you don’t go searching for them.
