Cheating in order to banish cheating?

[John Fairbairn]

https://www.chess.com/news/view/fide-wo ... ulia-osmak

I have argued here before not in favour a zero tolerance approach to cheating but rather in favour of considering - to see if it might work. This latest episode from the chess world inclines me to think it can't work.

Clearly FIDE was not really trying to cheat, but the end result of their approach amounts to cheating against the players, in my view.

To start with, they acknowledge that they know themselves that their process is dodgy enough that they can't claim a player cheated - just that there was a whiff of doubt about a game, with an implicit acknowledgment the smell may have con from elsewhere.

But the stench of nationalism is in the air, too. At least chess players get by, just, and with plenty of rancour, administratively by (a) having an international body, (b) using English as the lingua franca, and (c) having the CAS court as a backstop.

None of these things apply in go. The mind boggles as to how an international dispute would be handled in the go world.

[Javaness2]

It is rumoured that the panel was split 2-1-1 on the decision.
There is also some speculation that her poor eyesight cost her the decision.
Yet another dubious decision by FIDE

[RobertJasiek]

50 seconds analysis per game to judge about cheating is possibly hours too short.

We have leant from the Claudia Pechstein case that a trial must be fair. Not hearing an accused player is not a fair trial. Members of the Fair Play Panel ought to be ashamed of participating in a system designed to deny a fair trial. If CAS should judge at all, its judgement can only be that the tournament's arbitration has not provided a fair trial.

Zoom as malware-like software is sufficient evidence that players are treated unfairly.

Concerning the detail of suspicious eye movements, it is common advice by doctors to regularly look away from monitors for better health. Trying to interpret such as cheating is an attack on health.

[Boidhre]

It's incredible to me that it doesn't sound like the testing was being done blind. Which is an enormous issue with something like this where there is no appeal or similar. Beyond methods used, time spent and everything else, this on its own would cause very serious problems.