Chess: Carlsen expands on 'cheating' suspicions

Magnus Carlsen on Monday broke his near-silence after dominating chess discussions for the better part of three weeks with his cryptic allegations that 19-year-old US player Hans Niemann may have cheated in a shock victory against Carlsen at the beginning of September. 

"I believe that Hans Niemann has cheated more — and more recently — than he has publicly admitted," Carslen said in a statement. "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." 

The Norwegian outgoing world champion, who elected earlier this year not to defend his crown and seek a sixth title, said that he was still "limited in what I can say without explicit permission from Niemann to speak openly," but that there was more he would like to say.

Carlsen is yet to provide any real evidence for his allegations against Niemann; it's not clear whether he or his allies have any. 

How did the scandal start?

Carlsen lost an over the board, in-person game to Niemann on September 4 at the Sinquefield Cup in St. Louis.

Niemann had been drafted in as a last minute replacement in that competition when another scheduled competitor, Richard Rapport, caught COVID and could not travel to the US. 

The day after the defeat, Carlsen tweeted he would be withdrawing from the competition, the first time in his career he had taken such a step. The keen football fan shared a video of manager Jose Mourinho saying that he couldn't say any more or else he would get in trouble. 

This and other hints either from Carlsen or those close to him, coupled with information about Niemann having cheated in online games as a youngster, led people to infer the Norwegian chess grandmaster was questioning whether he had lost fair and square in St. Louis.

A few days later, when Carlsen and Niemann again faced each other in an online competition, the Champions Chess Tour, Carlsen played a single move with black and then resigned. He went on to win the competition in question handsomely, sealing victory on Sunday, with the self-inflicted defeat to Niemann in the preliminary round robin phase his only loss of the entire event. 

"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," Carlsen said in Monday's statement.

This could put tournament organizers in a difficult position, effectively having to weigh whether they can invite Niemann if that means the world's most famous player might boycott the event.

Global chess federation FIDE said late last week that it shared Carlsen's concerns about cheating and took it seriously, but it also criticized the five-time champion's choice of approach to the matter, saying "We strongly believe that there were better ways to handle this situation." 

FIDE had said it would be willing to investigate Carlsen and Niemann's September 4 game thoroughly once "adequate initial proof" was provided.

Is it easy to cheat in chess? 

Allegations of cheating are almost as old as the game, but in online competitions in particular, the temptation and ability to cheat with ease has been transformed in the information era. Anybody who owns a smartphone can get access to artificial intelligence programs that are vastly superior to any human chess players.

Carlsen's resignation from the Sinquefield Cup raised eyebrows, however, because security checks do exist at physical tournaments and the penalties for over the board cheating in rated events are draconian, with a lifetime ban possible for anybody caught red-handed.

Calling cheating an "existential threat to the game," Carlsen urged "chess organizers and all those who care about the sanctity of the game we love" to "seriously consider increasing security measures and methods of cheat detection for over the board chess."

Niemann gave an extensive interview soon after Magnus' first withdrawal where he admitted to past wrongdoing but also said he had not cheated for years and had never cheated over the board. He said his past bans from chess websites had shamed him and motivated him to dedicate himself to the game more. He also offered to play naked if that would satisfy people's suspicions, something that would not be unprecedented.

Carlsen's supporters argue that Niemann's rapid rise in rating points during the COVID pandemic is suspicious. Niemann's supporters counter that the teenager is still of the age where leading chess players improve swiftly.

Niemann's rating rise in his late teenage years has been an outlier — starting comparatively late and accelerating rapidly — but is also not without precedent in the game's history.

Carlsen's entourage and the chess.com playing website that recently moved to purchase Carlsen's business empire, the Play Magnus Group, are yet to provide any hard evidence. However, they have intimated that they have more data they cannot make public.

Chess.com suspended Niemann from its site soon after Carlsen's defeat. It issued a statement saying it had reached out to Niemann privately with information on cheating that the American had not openly acknowledged.

The case has divided opinion for weeks now. Critics of Carlsen allege he is torching a young man's reputation and possibly his future livelihood without providing any evidence. Supporters argue that Carlsen has never taken such a drastic step in a career spanning almost two decades, while some leading players including Ian Nepomniatchi, Hikaru Nakamura and Levon Aronian have intimated that they might share some of the outgoing world champion's suspicions.

Edited by: John Silk