Suhana: Reviews Magnus' Allegations of Chess Cheating by Hans

“For a few weeks, Hans Moke Niemann, a 19-year-old American chess grandmaster, was heavily circulated in the news after Magnus Carlsen, a five-time world chess champion, made allegations of cheating against Niemann in September.” 

BY SUHANA KUMAR
STUYVESANT HIGH SCHOOL
HER LEAGUE COACH & HER NEWS COLUMNIST

Courtesy of Grand Chess Tour: Magnus Carlsen and Hans Niemann shake hands

For a few weeks, Hans Moke Niemann, a 19-year-old American chess grandmaster, was heavily circulated in the news after Magnus Carlsen, a five-time world chess champion, made allegations of cheating against Niemann in September. 

At a young age, Niemann was a very independent person. He was financially stable and at 18 lived in his own studio in New York. He was a quick learner and adopted as an intelligent student by chess coach Maxim Dugly. Niemann is also known to be a Twitch streamer, analyzing and/or playing chess games live. Since the pandemic hit, more online tournaments and games were being played, and Niemann participated in many. In a turn of events, however, Chess.com, a popular online chess platform, revealed a report suggesting that Niemann engaged in cheating. As CNBC reported, the report “allege[s]” that Niemann likely cheated in over 100 online chess games, including several prize money events.” 

Hikaru Nakamura, a Japanese-American grandmaster and top Twitch streamer, requested to read the report himself. He stated that while the report used “likely” many times and was not very confirmatory, it must have had a good amount of evidence to back it up and so Niemann was in fact cheating. Niemann did not appreciate Nakamura's take on the situation, as he later included him in a lawsuit centered around the incident. In the lawsuit, he filed for 100 million dollars in damages. 

Niemann later admitted, but prior to the lawsuit, that he had cheated online only twice, once as a pre-teen and once later at 16 years old. He claimed that this would never occur again and he is looking to prove his ability at in-person events. Fast forward to the 2022 Sinquefield Cup, where he played Magnus Carlsen. When Carlsen found out Niemann was invited to the tournament and was playing in it, he indicated after dropping out that he considered dropping out earlier but ended up staying in. Carlsen advocates for high security in chess tournaments as he believes it is becoming increasingly easy to cheat. Furthermore, he alleges he was aware of Niemann's cheating history and claims he wanted to avoid any situation in relation to that.

When Carlsen and Neimann ended up playing each other in the tournament, Carlsen missed a few of the ‘best moves’ and Niemann responded surprisingly well on the board, which didn’t align with his recent playing level according to Carlsen. Tied to Niemann’s sudden increase in skill, Carlsen expressed in a tweet that he alleged that because Niemann wasn't “fully concentrating on the game in critical positions…” and was able to “out[play] [him] as black in a way [he] think[s] only a handful of players could,” hints of cheating were revealing themselves. After his unexpected loss against the teen, Carlsen dropped out of the tournament. He requested that organizers add security checks and 15-minute delays to streamed games to reduce the chance of cheating. At a following tournament, the Julius Baer Generation Cup, which was played online and streamed by Chess24.com, Carlsen played only one move before forfeiting against Niemann in an apparently perceived act of protest.

A few days after the second tournament, Carlsen released his statement of accusation calling for “potential fair-play violations.” Neimann later played at the US Chess Championship. Because of the recent allegations, security was very intense at the tournament, installing metal detectors and even searching a banana Niemann had brought for any devices. Neimann won his first game and wanted to make it known that “this game is a message” of his ability. The next day, he filed a 100 million dollar lawsuit against Carlsen, Chess.com and Nakamura for “alleged defamatory statements” and unlawful collusion.

Carlsen has not presented any actual evidence of cheating, but when he alluded to Neimann's previous history, unusually well playing currently, and an alleged lack of focus, he apparently concluded that something was unusual. The wider chess community became involved immediately, as evident by the chaotic cacophony of chess opinions posted on social media. Because of such allegations and specifically which players it concerned, this news blew past the walls of the chess environment, appearing in CNBC, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and more. 

In response to the scandal, Chess.com banned Niemann from playing on their platform and FIDE launched an investigation into Carlsen’s claims. Despite the controversy, Chess.com continued with its purchase plans of the Play Magnus Group (PMG). Magnus Carlsen not only has an ownership stake in PMG, but also was expected to work with the new larger entity.

Numerous chess players and journalists commented on the situation, taking different sides but many landing on the consensus that they desire strict security and control to prevent any possible cheating. The topic of the scandal appeared in CBS Sports, ESPN and many other sport centered news outlets. This reveals that the game is now being discussed on sport platforms and receiving more attention than it previously did. 

I personally believe that the dialogue between Niemann and Carlsen positively impacted the chess sphere. Not only is the long-awaited increase in security being added to tournaments but also there has been a major jump in circulation of chess news. Whether the change in media discussions will continue for a longer period of time or not is still unknown, but the game has become increasingly popular over the last two years (for one, many chess platforms noticed a double in their membership count), so in combination with the recent incident, I hope to see a continuation. A lot of important announcements and achievements go unannounced or under-appreciated due to negative stigmas surrounding the game, so having a chance to discuss global chess issues is a very great opportunity. Doing so opens many doors and increases overall interest in chess.