Suspected cheating in BBO

[HighLow21]

Hi everyone,

 

I recently sat down at a table where the running score, approximately, was 110 IMPs for my opponents to 10 IMPS for my side. Over the next 8-10 hands I became aware that they were quite good. However, something didn't sit right with me, and now reviewing the hands I played against them as well as the hands that were played before I sat down, the only possible explanation for their success seems to be cheating. Some examples:

 

(EXAMPLES DELETED BY INQUIRY)

 

The list could go on, but this gives you a flavor of it. There are probably 10 other things that happened that are anywhere between surprisingly good play and almost certainly impossible without knowing what your partner holds (and maybe the opponents too, with the aid of an independent kibitzer).

 

The question is: what should I do about this? In my view, if someone at BBO looks at the evidence and decides there's simply no way that someone could play and bid so well without having UI repeatedly, I'd really like to hear that there's a way to get these people permanently barred. Because based on what I observed, it seems impossible that they could perform so well without at least knowing each others' holdings (and in a few cases, without knowing all 4 exact holdings).

 

-Tate

Edited March 8, 2012 by inquiry
Make it harder to find the names of the cheaters

[HighLow21]

OK thanks Ben. I will forward the full text of the report to the email address you described. (I have it saved here on my hard drive.)

 

-Tate

[inquiry]

I removed your examples.

 

you asked...

what should I do about this? In my view, if someone at BBO looks at the evidence and decides there's simply no way that someone could play and bid so well without having UI repeatedly, I'd really like to hear that there's a way to get these people permanently barred.

 

The correct answer is to report it to abuse at bridgebase dot com. Do not post here, as you are violating the TOS. Why? It took me no time at all from your examples to peg the offenders. Since it was so easy to find them, you violated the rules of this site against public accusations of cheating. Even though I have removed your examples, I suspect anyone wanting to look back over a couple of weeks of your play, might find the pair in question. So perhaps I should not even allow the question, but I will with the edits I made. I will send you the full text of your message so you can forward it to abuse along with the names of the questionable pair.

The "cheating pair here", and it seems clear they are cheating, have never played in a single bbo money game. People like them are a blight on the bbo community. They will be reported to abuse, but here is the reality of the situation.The bbo does not require positive identification of a user (no credit card number, no bank account, not even a facebook or paypal account). Anyone can create a new identity in a few seconds. Permanent bans, under the current conditions, is simply not possible. We can scramble a users password, effectively killing that username, but you yourself have more than one username. So how effective is that? It is something we can do. There is a move to build reputations (maybe by length of membership) so that only people with long established relationships can play in certain areas, so scrambling cheater passwords would keep them out. That maybe the eventual solution to this situation.

 

WHEN players play in money games, they have to provide, among other things, a paypal account, a check, or some way to pay their entry fee. Here cheaters can be reasonably punished. Their money's taken away or not accepted in the future, they and their aliases blocked from all money-based games. Their points awarded removed, any prize they might have won (cash etc), not awarded. In things like acbl or other national events (bbo italy for instance), they can be turned into the national organization.

 

So in money events, cheaters can be properly dealt with, and there is an ACTVE ethics department on bbo that handles these type situations in rating point events. (The checking is proactive in those events, people not reported are often caught, people report are always investigated) The truth of the matter is, little is done about main room cheaters. Sure we have banned many, many of them over the years. They just don't stayed banned. But one thing for sure, they don't play in rating point events. Here is a suggestion.

 

1. play in bbo rating point events (not free of course)

2. play in team games against people you know and or trust

3. play in the few free tournaments where the TD's ban known cheaters and actively keep their game cheat free

4. find honest players and play against them in the main room or relaxed room

5. don't worry about the cheaters and try to improve your game.

 

I go with 2 & 4 myself, although occassionally 1. I also train with a partner against robots in relaxed room. Here we might make the players at the other tables unhappy, because we sometimes discuss the hand during play (related to signalling agreements, not what we actually have in the hand).

[blackshoe]

How the heck did tate reply to Ben's message two minutes before Ben posted it? :D

[aguahombre]

How the heck did tate reply to Ben's message two minutes before Ben posted it? :D

Ben is predictable?

[Vampyr]

5. don't worry about the cheaters and try to improve your game.

 

There will always be cheaters; it is just too easy to do. Some will be too subtle to be caught.

 

But since online bridge is basically for practice, it seems not to be too big a disadvantage if opponents play and defend perfectly!

[inquiry]

How the heck did tate reply to Ben's message two minutes before Ben posted it? :D

 

 

No magic.

 

He had replied to his own thread before I gave my answer. He then edited his reply, basically deleting everything in his second post to respond to me.

[the hog]

Seriously Tate, who cares whether they cheat or not? What does it matter? It actually makes you lift your game a bit.

[Bbradley62]

But since online bridge is basically for practice, it seems not to be too big a disadvantage if opponents play and defend perfectly!

Seriously Tate, who cares whether they cheat or not? What does it matter? It actually makes you lift your game a bit.

Sucky attitude by both of you. It is reasonable to expect that if you sit down to play in MBC (or anywhere else on BBO) your opponents will be following the rules. I certainly hope BBO is throwing the book at cheaters.

First time offenders will be warned that their behavior is not acceptable and they will be put on probation. Subsequent complaints concerning a member on probation will result in that member's permanent expulsion from this site.

 

If a member is expelled from this site it is illegal for that person to try to return. Unfortunately, it is not always technically possible for us to keep that person away, but we will get that member's ISP and the police involved if necessary. We are serious about this.

[aguahombre]

BBO certainly agrees with you, Bradley. I have never seen any flipant attitude toward the problem.

 

They have posted the problems they have in dealing with it, but never shined it on.

[blackshoe]

No magic.

 

He had replied to his own thread before I gave my answer. He then edited his reply, basically deleting everything in his second post to respond to me.

 

I figured it'd be something like that. :)

[the hog]

Sucky attitude by both of you. It is reasonable to expect that if you sit down to play in MBC (or anywhere else on BBO) your opponents will be following the rules. I certainly hope BBO is throwing the book at cheaters.

 

 

Doesn't worry me if they need to boost their egos by cheating. If it worries you, ok, that is your prerogative. Don't call my atitude "sucky", whatever that means. I am not playing for sheep stations; it woulfd appear that you are.

[jdeegan]

There will always be cheaters; it is just too easy to do. Some will be too subtle to be caught.

 

But since online bridge is basically for practice, it seems not to be too big a disadvantage if opponents play and defend perfectly!

:P Well said! If your ego depends on your bridge score, heaven help you.

[Zelandakh]

Edited March 10, 2012 by inquiry
violation of TOS

[HighLow21]

Zelendakh -- the explanation almost verbatim was this:

 

Me: "What was 2D supposed to be?"

 

They: "What you don't know? Everybody knows."

 

Me: "Clearly not everybody."

 

They: "LOL."

 

Me: "And why did your partner respond 2H?"

 

They: "The opening 2D forces partner to respond 2H."

 

Yeah, right.

[Oof Arted]

I think a Few of us Know/Strongly Suspect a pair are Cheating either by being in the same room Skyping or MSN it is so so easy

 

Worse suspicion are that in at least one case a player is logged in and playing as 'x' and Kibbing as 'y'

 

Duno the answer though if people cannot play but find they can win by cheating nothing we cabn do EXCEPT name and shame BUT as Inquiry points out they will just log in as A.N.other

[brian_m]

There will always be cheaters; it is just too easy to do. Some will be too subtle to be caught.

 

But since online bridge is basically for practice, it seems not to be too big a disadvantage if opponents play and defend perfectly!

 

For some of us, due to personal circumstances, it's all the bridge we have.

 

Given Ms. Rohan's attitude, I'd like to suggest that a flag be added to all user profiles, indicating whether or not a player will report suspected cheating. That way, people who share this apparent liking for opps who play double dummy can have their wish, and (presumably) those of us who prefer a fair game will be more likely to get one, as the cheats will prefer to get their IMP fix against people whom they know won't report them.

 

Sounds like an all-win situation to me.

[wank]

it's possible to see someone else's hand history? how so?

[billw55]

There will always be cheaters; it is just too easy to do. Some will be too subtle to be caught.

 

But since online bridge is basically for practice, it seems not to be too big a disadvantage if opponents play and defend perfectly!

Interesting. I would agree with this if bridge was a total information game such as chess or Go. But in bridge, cheating allows them to do things that are essentially impossible for honest players of any skill level. Absurd fielding of psychs, as happened in this case, is one example; also impossible leads, dropping stiff kings, etc etc.

 

I do not think that practicing against this will be a good thing. I might develop habits of allowing for actions/layouts that are extremely unlikely or outright impossible with rational single dummy opponents. This could actually damage my play rather than help it.

[billw55]

As an aside to inquiry: if you have concluded that a player or pair is in fact cheating, I would not object to posting the hands publicly with usernames.

[Zelandakh]

it's possible to see someone else's hand history? how so?

BBO Hand Records - enter the user name and a selected period. For example, putting in "wank" and "1 month" gives results of +1.04 IMPs per board and 57.22% MP average. This monthly average is often a better guide to a random player's ability than their self-rating.

[barmar]

As an aside to inquiry: if you have concluded that a player or pair is in fact cheating, I would not object to posting the hands publicly with usernames.

That's not how this game is run. Real world bridge leagues wouldn't condone such behavior, and neither should we.

[aguahombre]

As an aside to inquiry: if you have concluded that a player or pair is in fact cheating, I would not object to posting the hands publicly with usernames.

That's not how this game is run. Real world bridge leagues wouldn't condone such behavior, and neither should we.

That is the appropriate position for real world bridge leagues and for responsible on-line sites.

 

But, we all have a little gossip monger in us :rolleyes:

[rduran1216]

BBO Hand Records - enter the user name and a selected period. For example, putting in "wank" and "1 month" gives results of +1.04 IMPs per board and 57.22% MP average. This monthly average is often a better guide to a random player's ability than their self-rating.

 

 

BBO players self ratings are about as reliable as Muhammad Ali's balance. That is true.

[inquiry]

As an aside to inquiry: if you have concluded that a player or pair is in fact cheating, I would not object to posting the hands publicly with usernames.

 

This is not open for discussion, as the policy I am quoting was in place before I became associated with the bbo or this forum, and it is not changing, for a variety of very good reasons. In the beginning, I felt like you did, shame the bastards. But I agreed to follow and enforce the bbo policies. I have come around to understand the bbo policies are the best. One reason is that there are a number of people who feel like you do, and they post online (but not in our forum and not via lobby chats in the bbo itself --- which are sure ways to get your password scrambled). Sometimes, they "out" cheaters, sometimes they display their own bridge ignorance calling perfectly normal stuff as cheating. One example is a partnership I know well uses 2c-2h as "instant double negative" and 2C-2nt to show a positive hand with hearts. In accusing this pair as cheating in an online blog, one person using such an auction as absolute proof of cheating, because the notrump slam only makes from the side with the heart suit so "they manufactured" the auction to play it from that side.

 

There are some 30 or so "proof" hands in that fellows blog, almost all of them are no evidence of cheating, and some of the statements in the blog are so wrong (one of the events the pair was accused of cheating in they scored 35% for the entire event, for instance) but the claim on a hand from the poor event was they always win. Users who were convinced by the "evidence" of cheating piled on and said that the culprit was averaging +0.90 imps per hand played and that benito was "only" averaging +.76 and michael seamon only +0.67 so this guy had to be much better than them or a cheater (no mention that the stars were only playing in jec matches against other stars, while the accused was facing very poor opponents).

 

it would become a zoo here if we allowed such post here, and that ignores possible slander lawsuits. So anything that can be linked to a player will be deleted and the poster could get into trouble with bbo if it continues.