Rise (??) in cheating recently

[bearmum]

When you only play two boards with somebody, if you don't call when it looks like it might be cheating on one board, how can the person ever be caught?

 

Third hand RHO opens 1♥.  I have something on the order of:

 

Dealer: ????? Vul: ???? Scoring: Unknown

♠ [space] ♥ ATxxxx ♦ KQxx ♣ AQx

 

I double.  Bidding goes 4S by P, double by RHO, 5H by me, 6C by partner, doubled, passed out, and not surprisingly made.

 

The director was called.  I don't know what was said, but I'm sure it was something to the effect that I might be cheating.  Why should I object to that?

Playing penalty doubles of 1 level openings is a very unusual agreement. Was it alerted?

 

Eric

I must be missing something ( NOT unusual I must admit!)--- why did u assume the 1♥X was penalty? Obviously the doubler's partner did NOT think so as he/she bid FOUR♠ :)

 

I am not sure WHAT the original doubler would have bid had the 4♠ had not been doubled -- BUT it was doubled :P

 

SHOULD the board have been reported as suspicious of cheating -------- IMHO NO :)

[EricK]

When you only play two boards with somebody, if you don't call when it looks like it might be cheating on one board, how can the person ever be caught?

 

Third hand RHO opens 1♥.  I have something on the order of:

 

<!-- ONEHAND begin --><table border='1'> <tr> <td> <table> <tr> <td> Dealer: </td> <td> ????? </td> </tr> <tr> <td> Vul: </td> <td> ???? </td> </tr> <tr> <td> Scoring: </td> <td> Unknown </td> </tr> </table> </td> <td> <table> <tr> <th> <span class='spades'> ♠ </span> </th> <td>  </td> </tr> <tr> <th> <span class='hearts'> ♥ </span> </th> <td> ATxxxx </td> </tr> <tr> <th> <span class='diamonds'> ♦ </span> </th> <td> KQxx </td> </tr> <tr> <th> <span class='clubs'> ♣ </span> </th> <td> AQx </td> </tr> </table> </td> <td>  </td> </tr> </table><!-- ONEHAND end -->

 

I double.  Bidding goes 4S by P, double by RHO, 5H by me, 6C by partner, doubled, passed out, and not surprisingly made.

 

The director was called.  I don't know what was said, but I'm sure it was something to the effect that I might be cheating.  Why should I object to that?

Playing penalty doubles of 1 level openings is a very unusual agreement. Was it alerted?

 

Eric

I must be missing something ( NOT unusual I must admit!)--- why did u assume the 1♥X was penalty? Obviously the doubler's partner did NOT think so as he/she bid FOUR♠ :)

 

I am not sure WHAT the original doubler would have bid had the 4♠ had not been doubled -- BUT it was doubled :P

 

SHOULD the board have been reported as suspicious of cheating -------- IMHO NO :)

I was making a semi-joke.

 

Obviously I didn't assume that the double was for penalty, but this was my very English way of pointing out that making a take out double on this hand was an unusual action.

 

Note also that my use of the word "unusual" in the last sentence was my very English way of pointing out that the double was incorrect.

 

Eric

[hotShot]

I think the amount of cheating at BBO is largely overestimated.

 

This is because:

1) A lot of pairs playing at BBO didnot agree on anything before they started playing. So in fact they are not only bidding and playing, but guessing most of the time.

 

2) A lot of BBO players, cannot not recognize worldclass/expert play, if neither of the opps have a star.

 

3) The way to win short BBO-tourneys is to score tops. This requires unusual leads and unusual play. If it fails you will get a bad score, but you will never win a BBO tourney with "normal" leads and play. You need to take more risks here.

[jtfanclub]

Note also that my use of the word "unusual" in the last sentence was my very English way of pointing out that the double was incorrect.

Eh. I was so certain the opps were psyching that I took a position.

 

Oops.

 

Oh well. Not the first stupid bid I'm made that turned out well.

 

The point is, when the opponents make a stupid or weird bid that turns out, you pretty much need to call the director. If you only get to see them for two boards, who's to say they aren't doing it every other board?

[EricK]

Note also that my use of the word "unusual" in the last sentence was my very English way of pointing out that the double was incorrect.

Eh. I was so certain the opps were psyching that I took a position.

 

Oops.

 

Oh well. Not the first stupid bid I'm made that turned out well.

 

The point is, when the opponents make a stupid or weird bid that turns out, you pretty much need to call the director. If you only get to see them for two boards, who's to say they aren't doing it every other board?

I realise what you were thinking. But I don't think making a negative double is the way to catch them out.

 

Also, psyches are rare. I still think it is more likely that opener has a heart suit than not.

 

Eric

[jtfanclub]

Note also that my use of the word "unusual" in the last sentence was my very English way of pointing out that the double was incorrect.

Eh. I was so certain the opps were psyching that I took a position.

 

Oops.

 

Oh well. Not the first stupid bid I'm made that turned out well.

 

The point is, when the opponents make a stupid or weird bid that turns out, you pretty much need to call the director. If you only get to see them for two boards, who's to say they aren't doing it every other board?

I realise what you were thinking. But I don't think making a negative double is the way to catch them out.

 

Also, psyches are rare. I still think it is more likely that opener has a heart suit than not.

 

Eric

I think we're all in agreement that it was a stupid bid that turned out well.

 

That wasn't the point of the story.

[bassplayer]

Well, my biggest problem is that BBO has no real cheating policy. Yes, cheating will always happen online. Yes, they have some some mild monitoring action in paid tourneys. But simply, if someone is caught cheating, nothing happens. Speaking with the "yellows", they tell me "yes, we caught so and so cheating. But we cant do anyting about it". This has clearly discouraged me from playing on BBO. I am stunned that the ACBL even permits "non-colored" masterpoints. I reviewed some other bridge sites and at least they will ban or suspend players. Much more than BBO will do. I will never ever, pay for any tourney, unless I learn or gear for cheating. Why not? When in Rome, do what the Romans do", right? I guess cheating is the only way to level the playing field. I am told by many BBO has teachers, world class players cheating in play. I know that most do not, but I can't tell which do. Wow, what an example Fred has set for bridge. If the teachers cheat, and I learn from a teacher, ergo, I need to cheat? No thanks, Fred.

[doofik]

I find accusations of cheating rather senseless. If we will presume that there are statistically successful lines of play good players will take, that's great. If we will presume that most players make up these statistics as they go along, that's not so great. Suddenly we have accusations of cheating because a player didn't take "the correct" line to succeed. Frankly, many players play whichever way their "card sense" will tell them to and there is no mathematical explanation for it. Please refrain from calling people cheaters if their thinking isn't in sync with yours when it comes to playing and enjoying this great game.

[uday]

I don't know where you get your information about 'nothing happens' to cheaters.

 

It all depends.

 

First, it depends on what you consider a cheater.

I've seen people shout "Cheater!" at inappropriate times. For instance, that an explanation for 2D "5+S" was cheating bec. it did not mention that the bidder said nothing about D.

 

Second, it depends on the context.

In the MBC, Bassplayer should disable kibs. That will stop someone from self-speccing. If he thinks his opps are cheating via, say, Skype, he should move to another table.

You could help us by reporting blatant cases to abuse@bridgebase.com and perhaps by marking the perps as enemies so we know you don't particularly want to play against them again.

 

In paid games, and in particular ACBL games, we take cheating more seriously. We eyeball results weekly. However, we're also more careful about what we do with these suspected cheats.

Among other things,

- you don't want to accuse someone of cheating too casually

- ACBL headquarters has some policies about banning that we need to follow

 

The process of determining whether someone is cheating is sometimes easy, sometimes quite difficult. We've sometimes had to analyze hundreds of hands to come to a conclusion. When we find cheaters, we warn, ban, report to the ACBL, etc, depending on context.

 

It is possible that offering ratings would help here -- suspicious players could reject the opportunity to play against high ratings.

 

Anyway, this is a complicated subject. But we don't do nothin', so to speak

 

U

[AlexJonson]

If you are worried about online cheating, don't play online.

 

The probability is extremely low, unless you already know the people that you think are cheating.

[kenberg]

Care is needed to get to any realistic conclusions.

 

Bass says he will never pay to play in an online tourney because of what he has been told about cheating. Well, I do play in the acbl tourneys so I have some experience with them. As Uday says, it depends on what you consider cheating. You lead a stiff toward the KJx on the board and lho's is noticeably slower than usual. He is thinking of rising with the ace? Maybe yes, maybe no. Happens in f2f also. I was once accused of making such a coffeehouse move. I swear I have never done it intentionally and I had no idea what he was talking about, but he was adamant that I had done so.

 

The following happened in an acbl indy, where sayc is the default, recently: Lho opened 1NT. Rho, with a profile that said beginner, after a bit bid 2D. Lho bid 2H. Rho thought quite a while and bid 3NT. Lho, with three hearts and two spades (admittedly the AQ), passed. You can imagine that it never occurred to my partner that I instead of dummy would be holding five hearts, so he led a side suit and dummy's diamonds were run.

 

These things happen. But a pair that is communicating by phone while they play? In acbl tourneys, it hasn't happened to me. There have been times that I have been suspicious but then I look up their actual results over the course of the full tourney and I conclude that either they are the world's most incompetent cheaters or they just bid/play like a pair of nuts. I confess I do largely avoid the tourneys that offer cash prizes. Even if the prize is small, five or ten bucks or whatever, this seems to be tempting fate. But I have little actual experience with it so I should not say much.

 

Incidentally, I think if a yellow really told Bass that they caught a specific so and so cheating then the yellow needs to be changed to a pink. Whatever the right way of dealing with the situation was, loosely blabbing it about is not right.

[mtvesuvius]

Back when I was 9 and 10, 5 or 6 years ago (the age before speedballs!), when I was trying to make Life Master, I foolishly thought online points counted as Black Points... The only colour I needed. I had a period of a month or so where I played as many online tournaments as my schedule would reasonably allow, anywhere from 1 to 5 a day. I'd pick up partners and hope for the best, but generally did pretty well. Back then I don't remember many incidents where I said "Wow... They really must be cheating". In fact I can remember only one, which was when LHO opened 1♣, RHO bid 1♥, LHO bid 2♥ (With his AKx AKJx AKxx xxx), and RHO bid 6♥ on Qx Qxxxxx xxx A. I didn't make a big deal about it, and I don't remember who the players were anymore. I usually made a note on their profile if I suspected something though.

 

Nowadays, over the past month or two, people have done a lot of things that have struck me as "suspicious", however I do suspect some of it is improvement, and that I wouldn't have noticed these things before. I assume some of it is also just dumb luck, and the opponents really don't have any clue, but just stumble into a perfect contract. But I also believe that at least some of the pairs, especially the ones who do it twice or three times in a round, have a wire of some sort. I guess I'm kinda paranoid, and perhaps over-suspicious, but I can remember at least 2 or 3 pairs that I was 100% sure they cheated.

 

Does this say much? Not really, but I think the rise of cheaters (and bad players lol) in speedballs has been tremendous.

Should you avoid speedballs because of this? I don't think so... While there certainly are some people who cheat, most are clueless, and a few know what they are doing. I think of it kind of like a decent club game. I don't believe that the existence of cheaters is enough to warrant not playing... After all, if there was one pair at the local club who you suspected was cheating, but the rest were fine, would you never go back to that club again?

[JLOGIC]

lol I was reading this post not realizing it was a necro and I was like wow a bunch of people came out of the woodworks for this thread... then I saw misho and looked at the date. Then I went to where it was necro'd and saw doofik had posted! Blast from the past, ♥ doofik

[Vampyr]

Hi friends!

It is no chance even great pairs like Garotzo-Beladona, Reese-Shapiro (sorry if not right names) was catched while cheating at table... Misho

"Sorry if not right names"? With that as a disclaimer you can suggest that Garazzo and Belladonna, two of the greats of the game, were cheaters?

[barmar]

When Reese-Shapiro were caught cheating in the 60's, they were considered two of the greats of the game.

 

However, since the introduction of screens in high-level championships, I think we can be more confident that the greats are honest.

[Vampyr]

When Reese-Shapiro were caught cheating in the 60's, they were considered two of the greats of the game.

Yes, but nothing of the sort has ever been suggested about Garazzo-Belladonna, as far as I know, except in this thread.

[barmar]

Yes, but nothing of the sort has ever been suggested about Garazzo-Belladonna, as far as I know, except in this thread.

He did say he wasn't sure if he was remembering the right names. Wasn't there another well-known Italian pair that was accused of cheating and suspended a couple of years ago?

[Vampyr]

He did say he wasn't sure if he was remembering the right names. Wasn't there another well-known Italian pair that was accused of cheating and suspended a couple of years ago?

Yes, Buratti and Lanzarotti. They were suspended for about a week.

[Trinidad]

I would guess Misho is referring to Facchini - Zucchelli. They were on the team that won the Bermuda Bowl in 1975, together with Garozzo and Belladonna. Facchini - Zucchelli was the pair involved in the "foot tapping incident".

 

Rik

[Zelandakh]

Ah, accusations of cheating on BBO are always fun. A couple of days ago my partner was accused of cheating when she alerted a bid as 23+ and when her dummy came down it was 22 hcp with good honour concentration + shape. Goodness knows what this individual would have said had I psyched! If you believe someone is cheating then finish the current hand and leave the table. You should only make the accusation if you are very sure and in that case abuse@bbo.com is probably the correct forum.

 

As for the finger and foot-tapping incidents, the jury is still out on both. The Italians were not prosecuted for the accustaions (but dividers under the table were brought in and they were quickly dropped from international competition) while there are strong arguments, not to mention whole books, on both sides regarding Reese-Shapiro. Perhaps the most high-profile case of "cheating" in bridge in recent years came from the Norwegian League where the Hels were (loosely) involved in an incident of match fixing (fake score posted for a match that was not played). One of them was briefly suspended and missed a major event. I would also stress that no accusation of cheating at the table has been made here.

[kenberg]

Indeed some accusations say more about the accuser than about the accused. Once, playing with a casual partner, rho opened 1NT. I had a running six card spade suit and an outside ace. I doubled, lho inquired, partner said it was for penalties. Three passes later I ran seven tricks. Rho then announced he was going to call the director because the double of a strong no trump supposedly shows 15 or more high card points and I only has 14. Lho talked him out of this director call.

 

Really I don't see how anyone can say "I think maybe so and so was caught cheating but maybe I don't have the names right". Sure, and I think maybe your mother .... Oh yeah, that was someone else maybe.

[wyman]

"I think maybe so and so was caught cheating but maybe I don't have the names right". Sure, and I think maybe your mother .... Oh yeah, that was someone else maybe.

Saved as signature. wp sir.

[nige1]

A suggestion, I made, some years ago, on rec.games.bridge:

 

On-line sites can easily implement cheat-diagnostic software that randomly injects specially constructed death-trap deals that provide an early-warning system. The software would automatically record, collate, and report anomalous successful outcomes by players/pairs on such deals. A series of such results would suggest further human investigation. Example deals:

• a poor game/slam makes on slender values because key cards lie well.
• an excellent game/slam fails because key cards all lie badly
• a game/slam makes on anti-percentage plays e.g. first round finesse for the queen with ten cards.

You get the idea :)

 

If the deliberate construction of such deals smacks of entrapment, then perhaps randomly dealt hands could be sifted for suitable candidates.

 

Psychological advantages of this process are that

• it is more convincing than accusing opponents after they've performed annoyingly well against you.
• it actively deters cheats, if publicised.

But he main advantage is that it is automatic and objective: it can assemble a better statistical case.

[han]

Good old 2003, when people still cheated on BBO.

[nigel_k]

Ah, accusations of cheating on BBO are always fun. A couple of days ago my partner was accused of cheating when she alerted a bid as 23+ and when her dummy came down it was 22 hcp with good honour concentration + shape. Goodness knows what this individual would have said had I psyched! If you believe someone is cheating then finish the current hand and leave the table. You should only make the accusation if you are very sure and in that case abuse@bbo.com is probably the correct forum.

 

As for the finger and foot-tapping incidents, the jury is still out on both. The Italians were not prosecuted for the accustaions (but dividers under the table were brought in and they were quickly dropped from international competition) while there are strong arguments, not to mention whole books, on both sides regarding Reese-Shapiro. Perhaps the most high-profile case of "cheating" in bridge in recent years came from the Norwegian League where the Hels were (loosely) involved in an incident of match fixing (fake score posted for a match that was not played). One of them was briefly suspended and missed a major event. I would also stress that no accusation of cheating at the table has been made here.

Since Helness was not involved in the Norwegian incident at all, maybe you should take your own advice and only make the accusation if you are very sure.