Board Game Arena

I am a long time chess player with > 15000 chess games online. I was also playing chess engines a lot. If you play chess a lot you can "feel" if a move is a computer move. Recently a player felt very suscpicious for me.
VERONIKA2181, or now the name is changed into SAMUSARAN
https://boardgamearena.com/player?id=90864831

I checked the engine after our game and gues what... Her moves mathed almost perfectly the top moves of the Stockfish engine on lichess.com. I checked more of her games with other palyers with the same result. Players with those accuracy are banned within 2-3 games on chess.com or lichess.com.
This is not human play. No Human plays like this. Even not super GrandMasters or the World champion.

More on that: she claims to be another real Player. She says she is top 100 Russian women player with ELO 2075. This narrows down to only one person. Lezhepekova, Veronika. https://ratings.fide.com/profile/24146137. Also the account was previously named VERONIKA2181. Now the owner changed the name. The age of 26 supports this fact.
The real Veronika lives in Spain. You can find it in socials. The account owner claims to live in Moscow and work as a passport controller. I happened to speak Russian and was trying to speak russian with the owner of the accout. No response on russian. Also the accounts avatar is not the real Veronika. I know it from the her socials.

So I see here a clear cheating in chess. And also a identity theft.
The first is leading to unfair play. The second to potential pollution of the reputation of the real Veronika.

How does BGA deals with that?

Hi, I found another player (ApolloM) that is cheating with the computer engine of Litchess.
https://boardgamearena.com/player?id=84859589

I have just played with him twice and the second time I use the computer engine of Litchess. All his moves are perfect
So I deduced easily that he is a cheater.

I will propose to close the Arena for Chess (Like for Hanabi) due to the lots of unfair players... It is a shame to play like this !

!

I will propose to close the Arena for Chess (Like for Hanabi) due to the lots of unfair players... It is a shame to play like this !

I think it is to radical solution. In my opinion banning the cheater would be proper action.

BordGameFreak wrote: ↑06 July 2021, 17:11 So I see here a clear cheating in chess. And also a identity theft.
The first is leading to unfair play. The second to potential pollution of the reputation of the real Veronika.

How does BGA deals with that?

There are 300+ games on bga, chess.com is barely capable of dealing with the cheaters (cheating there is still relatively high, compared to lichess). BGA has a much smaller team in comparison, and developers are volunteers, if they somehow figure out a way to stop cheating for chess (which would take valuable time better spent elsewhere) then they'd have to figure out how to stop cheating for at least 50-100 games. Which is just infeasible. Just play chess somewhere else.

As for the identity theft case, BGA isn't really a social network with "verified credentials" such as Twitter, so I don't think it is really their responsibility to do anything about that. It is like e-mailing someone to tell them that you're X titled-player, is it the e-mail service provider's responsibility to do anything about it?

Superluminal wrote: ↑06 July 2021, 17:11
How does BGA deals with that?

They don't deal with cheating because they don't care.

It's difficult to analyze chess cheaters on a case-by-case basis—you have to assess the relevance and accuracy of each move and draw individual conclusions based on the percentage of perfect moves relative to the player's profile. At the same time, it's very easy for anyone to cheat using a computer. So the work required from moderators would be considerable.

That's why there are websites specialized in chess that focus solely on that. To get the full experience in this area, you need to turn to that type of platform.

But BGA will never be a site specialized in chess—they already have over 1000 games to manage…

URjustSOL wrote: ↑13 April 2025, 13:14 They don't deal with cheating because they don't care.

I don't think so. It's a tall order for a small site.

Roua wrote: ↑28 April 2025, 17:55

URjustSOL wrote: ↑13 April 2025, 13:14 They don't deal with cheating because they don't care.

I don't think so. It's a tall order for a small site.

really? I just red-thumbed 2 players who were working together and what did the pop-up say? "Remember to report players if they said something you didn't like in chat."

It's clear they're quick on the ban-hammer if somebody says something you don't like (look at all the red banners here in the forums) but actual cheating? nope. Edit: Everyone, including this site, prioritizes the issues they think are most important.

URjustSOL wrote: ↑30 April 2025, 14:14

Roua wrote: ↑28 April 2025, 17:55

URjustSOL wrote: ↑13 April 2025, 13:14 They don't deal with cheating because they don't care.

I don't think so. It's a tall order for a small site.

really? I just red-thumbed 2 players who were working together and what did the pop-up say? "Remember to report players if they said something you didn't like in chat."

It's clear they're quick on the ban-hammer if somebody says something you don't like (look at all the red banners here in the forums) but actual cheating? nope. Edit: Everyone, including this site, prioritizes the issues they think are most important.

It's easier to censor than to identify cheaters.

Please note" If you're going to cheat for the win, just tell me. I'll resign the game, you win, I'm ok with it.