Dealing with cheaters

@boombox2000 said ^

Is there even any position, that cares about cheating requests?
Comparing to Chess.com, it seems like no one cares about cheating reports. For comparison, on Chess.com nearly 10 percent of my outgoing reports, had been proved right- on lichess out of almost 40 cases i get no response whatsoever.

Wait till you find out you can be shadow mute...

I don't know whether Lichess checks unrated games for cheating or not. If not and if you consider cheating a big problem, there is a simple solution - play rated games.

@chavezo said ^

@SubCulture can you post here a link to a game (or, better, several games) where you think the winner was cheating? I am curious about how to detect cheating in such fast games. I play mostly correspondence, and classical, where cheating should be easy (plenty of time to check engines, ask friends, and whatnot), and yet, I don't have a single example where I think I lost to a cheater.

AFAIK, posting such a link here is against the site rules.

@ILikeBlitz said ^

AFAIK, posting such a link here is against the site rules.

Ah, I was not aware of that. I asked because I looked at some games that @SubCulture lost. In none of the few I looked at I saw anything that would suggest cheating. For example, the number of blunders on both sides was comparable and the rating of the players is also comparable, so some wins and losses are to be expected against such a pool of players. I expected to see wins in which the suspect player played with great accuracy, no blunders, or a low rated player playing at 1800-level. I saw none of that. So, my conclusion is that I didn't look at the games @SubCulture is referring to, and that is why I asked for a link to a specific game.

But if posting a link is against the rules, then I just won't worry about this.

Lichess looks at reports and bans many cheaters. That said, it sometimes happens that I write a good report concerning an obvious cheater yet nothing happens for a long time. (Sometimes even if I mail someone from Lichess. I don't have a direct contact to the anti-cheating team.) Those players mostly get banned later on anyway.
Dear @Deadban, if you message me, I can give you a very clear example with a detailed explanation. The same thing (very clear violations being ignored for a relatively long time) occasionally happens on Chess.com as well, so it's not a problem of one server or another. Chess players are numerous, cheaters are also numerous (although far less numerous than some users believe and guess) and it's impossible to ban even all obvious cheaters quickly. It's impossible to ban all cheaters without banning many honest players as well. That said, well-written reports often succeed. (Although less often than some of us would like.)

A side note: There are many very strong seemingly untitled players on Lichess, more than on chess.com. This makes the situation less comfortable for their titled opponents, as it's often nearly impossible to deduce from their play whether you're facing a decent GM or a cheater. Several years ago it was much more recognizable. About 20 percent of my opponent's accounts have been banned or closed, and I often don't know whether a player was banned or just decided to close the account. I know what happened in a minority of cases and can guess reasonably well in many others, but many cases remain a mystery for me. At the same time I believe that the overall ratio of cheaters is way lower, just their concentration in the levels between 2600 and 3000 (in blitz) is much higher than in the whole pool, because they're overrated by hundreds of points and the proportion of top players in the whole pool is very low.)
If there were a better way to motivate titled players to verify their titles, it would remove many unnecessary fair-play reports at high rating levels. (I wouldn't have reported quite some opponents if I knew that they're titled.)

@TheDifferenceOfTier5 said ^

You can't deal with cheaters on this platform. Lichess blocks you from reporting them. When you try to submit a report, it asks for a link to the game. When you provide a link to the game, it blocks the report and still tells you that you must provide a link to the game. Essentially, you are not allowed to report anyone because the system is b...

Have you reported anyone for cheating recently? I know the reports used to work a while back. But since I tried on both my cell phone and my laptop with the same results, I am inclined to believe that the reporting issue is within the site.

@Gartholomew said ^

You can't deal with cheaters on this platform. Lichess blocks you from reporting them. When you try to submit a report, it asks for a link to the game. When you provide a link to the game, it blocks the report and still tells you that you must provide a link to the game. Essentially, you are not allowed to report anyone because the ...

Yes actually I have

I started on liches around 2014, at that time, reports were often followed by "you have been refound" to compensate your elo. There even was a group on this forum dedicated to spot cheaters.

Now the website is too big for a volunteer crew, you just have to accept that you play a certain amount of cheaters. If that too hard, which I can understand, play in real life or against stockfish at your level.

I often have doubts about my opponents, sometimes legitimated by analysis of 2 or 3 of their recent victories (I can admit a perfect game at my level, but 3 in a row is suspicious). I used to claim. but indeed, there is no longer response (Lichess don't have time/money -that's ok for me). So I stopped complaining and tell myself I lost either against a lucky player or against a strong machine but even if it affects my elo, it doesn't affect my level, on the contrary.

Play for fun, not for your elo. :)

The last cheater I reported got banned in 4 minutes after my report, maybe you're just reporting the wrong people,

that's it. they're dumb, and you're so smart. You should get a medal for it.