[inquiry]

Ok, it has been a while since this thread was started, but clearly cheating has been happening and clearly will always happen on-line. In fact, I now believe it is more rampant than I previously thought. In the past, I have agreed with Ron's comments above and while suspecting people from time to time of having a wire on the hand, I tend to ignore that possibility and go on about my day and have fun.

Sometimes, however, the offense is so outrageous, that I just have to say something. Below is such an example from an on-line BBO tournment. But frist here are some ground rules I would like everyone to follow if they want to discuss this hand.

First, and foremost, I didn't play this hand so don't waste your time trying to figure out who was who by searching hands I played.

Second, if you recongize this hand because you played it, don't mention that you played this hand in your reply (if you do, I will delete your reply and block your ability to post in the BBF for a few days and double raise your warning level), as people will then be able to use myhands and find the hand and the guilty (?) party from that. And anyone posting the names of the E/W players will find their post deleted, and themselves bannished from these forums for a month. My intention is not to publically humilate the offender (although clearly he/she deserves it), but rather to point out what seems to be clear case (at least imho) for illustrative purposes.

Third, be assured that I have already discovered that this hand was in fact reported to abuse@bridgebase.com, as it should have been. No doubt East on this hand will have to answer for his/her actions and will be dealt with properly. (who knows, their redouble may mean, precisely, I have about 20 hcp, singleton other major, huge fit for you first suit, first round control in their first suit, and tripleton honors in the unbid minor...yeah, right).

Fourth, for the record, the NS pair correctly reported this auction to the TD at the time it occured. What would you have done as the TD?

Scoring: IMP

---

West    North   East    South
        1♦!     1♠      Dbl     
Rdbl    2♥      4N      5♥      
6♠      Pass    7♠      Pass    
Pass    Pass    

As you can see, East 1♠ overcall was fine, but after his parnter's redouble, he essentially bid 7♠ on his own. He may as well just have overcalled 7♠ with his absolute minimum hand for a vulnerable overcall.

Now I give people the benefit of the doubt on some very strange auctions. Let's say EAST overcalled 1♠ on this auction and WEST decided that 7♠ would have some play against all hands his partner would overcall on, and so, without investigation, jumped to 7♠. You and I would have used blackwood, just to be sure partner has the ♠K and ♥A, but I wouldn't question the decision to bid 7♠. In fact, if opponent opened 1♦ partner overcalled vul and south made a negative double and I am looking at 19 hcp, I would be sure that north psyched making a 7♠ bid not that bad an idea (but again, I would check for keycards).

So if cheating is on the rise, how can you help?

1) Help stop others from routinely cheating. If you strongly suspect cheating, report extremely odd auctions to abuse@bridgebase.com along with a link to the hand in question. IF we all did this, anyone cheating a lot will therefore be reported many times and eventually, caught. If this was occuring, people would be much less likely to try to cheat.

2) Don't fall victim to what I guess I would call inadverted mini-cheating on your own. That is, don't open an instant messaging system and chat with your partner during play.

I suspect this second case is probably the most likely form of what I will call inadvertent cheating. Imagine EW above with chat on... and EAST overcalls 1♠ and south doubles. WEST looking at his hand, says something to his partner like...

WEST > omg this unbelievable, everyone is bidding and I have half the deck....

Now, west may not think that much of his comment, after all, he is going to bid like he has half the deck later... so he thinks this is not really an informative comment. And East may not think he is taking advantage of unauthorized info, his partner did REDOUBLE after all. But I think innocent comments (well, that one wouldn't have been innocent) in MSN messenger are the source of a lot of problems.

But here is example of what I think is more likely going on. Imagine, you are about to open and you ask your partner in ICQ, "do you play flannery". Partner replies, "no", and you then open 1♥. What conclusion will your partner draw from your bid? (and I saw this once, four or five hands into a game, a player wth ♥ and a short ♠ suit about to open light in the third seat asked is partner in public chat "do you bid if he plays flannery?" His partner said no, and 4th hand with ♠'s choose not to overcall 1♠, and they never got into the bidding after that. Cheating? Coffeehousing? Just slow getting system developed? BTW no other what you play chat for a few hands before and none after this question).

So I no longer believe Ron's view is right. If I see suspected cheating, I will report it. I hope others follow this lead. Let's try to make it hard on the on-line cheaters.

[helium]

Hi all:)
Have to say i agree a bit whit ben one this one, just becose a player don choose the 60% line it dosent mean hes cheeting, I just think of myself in this case and i do a lot of "strange"things on the table that gives me good scores. i never play bye % only on what my gut tell me too, this is becouse i dont know how to fin out what the % on every move is. but i have a good "nose" and make a lot of correct calls on just " table feeling" but this also give me a lot of bad scores so my score are very variable its often 0% and 100% this is somthing i try to work on now,im a little unstabil,but i dont have the rutine yet,only played 3 years,so i hope to start playing by the 60% line all the time,but inntill i know how i whould hate to be acuset of cheeting couse i play by 30% lines and not the availeble 70%

But i think its great that its a lot of talk about it laitly,i think and hope this make the cheethers think twise before cheething.i really dont see the point in cheeting anyway , you dont improve ur play by looking at answers, the only one that loose are you:))))

kenneth

[csdenmark]

Quote

West    North  East    South
        1♦!    1♠      Dbl   
Rdbl    2♥      4N      5♥     
6♠      Pass    7♠      Pass   
Pass    Pass

I dont think you have a clear case Ben. I would have made a signoff in 4♠ I think, maybe a CUE of ♥. You told it was from a tourney - I think you ought to consider a simple misclick not possible to correct.

Many poles are playing agressive bidding and I have also met people bidding NT for holding missing aces.

I think you ought to withdraw your report to abuse-institution Ben. The case is too poor.

If somebody want to spoil the fun for themselves - let them! In that way they cannot spoil the fun for me. I would instead prefer to have those persons who are aut. sucked out of a bridge-table in favour of a tournament to be reported for misconduct. They are ALL spoiling my fun.

[luis]

csdenmark, on Mar 12 2004, 08:25 PM, said:

Quote

West    North  East    South
        1♦!    1♠      Dbl   
Rdbl    2♥      4N      5♥     
6♠      Pass    7♠      Pass   
Pass    Pass

I dont think you have a clear case Ben. I would have made a signoff in 4♠ I think, maybe a CUE of ♥. You told it was from a tourney - I think you ought to consider a simple misclick not possible to correct.

Many poles are playing agressive bidding and I have also met people bidding NT for holding missing aces.

I think you ought to withdraw your report to abuse-institution Ben. The case is too poor.

If somebody want to spoil the fun for themselves - let them! In that way they cannot spoil the fun for me. I would instead prefer to have those persons who are aut. sucked out of a bridge-table in favour of a tournament to be reported for misconduct. They are ALL spoiling my fun.

This is ridiculous, East bidding doesn't make any sense at all.
His pd redoubles and with his minimum 1s overcall he asks for aces ?

It's one of the most solid cases I've ever seen.

[helium]

how could it be a missklikk? first 4 nt then 7 ♠
only one thing i could thing of if its not cheeting that east are very mad at hes partner for some reason and wont to punnish him/her by bidding crazy and that he was extreamly lucky,13 trick and not -800 as he tryed to create.

[inquiry]

csdenmark, on Mar 12 2004, 03:25 PM, said:

I think you ought to withdraw your report to abuse-institution Ben. The case is too poor.

Claus,

First, I didn't report it. When I saw the hand, having seen the hand for myself, I know who the players were and I know that it was reported by someone else.

Second, reporting a hand does not mean the person report is quilty of anything. They may have a great explaination why they bid like they did. Cooler heads than mine make the decision on that point. If you will notice, I even allowed as they may have an explaination... I think misclick can hardly be it however. You do realize that it was EAST not west who overcalled 1♠, it was EAST not west who jumped to 4NT, and it was EAST, not west that bid the grand slam after forcing the auction to the six level all by himself.

Third, I understand "reports" of cheating maybe nothing more than the reporters poor understanding of bridge logic or system played by his/her oppenents. In this case, no harm is done. I am sure uday or his representative is going to use a very high standard for deciding a case against a person who is reported. In fact, who knows, the EAST on this hand may have had an believable explaination and nothing comes of it. Or, maybe he had a case of pseudo-innocent unintentional unathorized information and his spirits got the better of him, and a simple warning to cut this out will do. Or maybe this is the 10th or 12th magic hand that has been report for this same person, and he has been warned two or three other times. The facts are, I have no idea if this was an offense, and if it was if it was a second, third or 10th. I would simply report it and move on.

Don't report them if you don't want to Claus. Until I saw this one, I only reported one player and I did that because two different people playing in a tournment I was directing told me he was "cheating". After looking at the hands, I thought they might be right. However, I believe that guy must have been either exonerated or simply warned becasue as far as I can see he was never banned, but looking at his latest play, I no longer find anything remotely suspecious in his play. Bottom line, if he wasn't cheating, my reporting him only to abuse@bridgebase.com did him no harm (I have never told ANYONE else his name), and if he was cheating maybe a warning from uday was enough to get him to stop.

I now will take the opposite track. I will not go out of my way looking for someone to report, but if I see it and it is blantant, I will report it.

Ben

[csdenmark]

Raise from 6 to 7 makes good sense with missing the CUE for the ace. I think only problem is 4NT which I would bid either 3♥ or 4♠ - maybe a 4♥-CUE. To me it mostly looks like a misclick - and as informed it was in a tourney - most of those disallows UNDO.

Ben - right to report anytime needed I think!

[uday]

I happen to find this bidding in need of an explanation. As usual in cases like this ( and it takes something like this - a sequence which almost everyone would , IMO, find implausible ), I suspend the users and await an explanation (via an email dialogue w/abuse@bridgebase.com)

I agree that suspect hands should be emailed to abuse@ along with a link, preferably, and preferably without expecting a response.

[csdenmark]

uday, on Mar 13 2004, 07:32 AM, said:

I happen to find this bidding in need of an explanation.  As usual in cases like this ( and it takes something like this - a sequence which almost everyone would , IMO, find implausible ),  I suspend the users and await an explanation (via an email dialogue w/abuse@bridgebase.com)

I agree that suspect hands should be emailed to abuse@ along with a link, preferably, and preferably without expecting a response.

Uday I think you are going wrong trying to pursue bidding sequenses. I think you will be right pursuing misconduct and making harm to others. This case mentioned by Ben has harmed nobody. - It looks to me just as a poor case similar to see the reason for intentionally disconnections by looking into scoring. - As Gerardo reported the Yellow ones dont use scoring as an evidence for intension so also bidding, even strange bidding, ought to be a private matter for the pair. They have an obligation to explain - but thats another story.

This case here harms nothing and nobody.

[helium]

csdenmark, on Mar 12 2004, 06:03 PM, said:

uday, on Mar 13 2004, 07:32 AM, said:

I happen to find this bidding in need of an explanation.  As usual in cases like this ( and it takes something like this - a sequence which almost everyone would , IMO, find implausible ),  I suspend the users and await an explanation (via an email dialogue w/abuse@bridgebase.com)

I agree that suspect hands should be emailed to abuse@ along with a link, preferably, and preferably without expecting a response.

Uday I think you are going wrong trying to pursue bidding sequenses. I think you will be right pursuing misconduct and making harm to others. This case mentioned by Ben has harmed nobody. - It looks to me just as a poor case similar to see the reason for intentionally disconnections by looking into scoring. - As Gerardo reported the Yellow ones dont use scoring as an evidence for intension so also bidding, even strange bidding, ought to be a private matter for the pair. They have an obligation to explain - but thats another story.

This case here harms nothing and nobody.

how can u say that? offcourse it harms someone, everybody how played in that tourney foresure, they got a score they never should have. and it harms everyone who plays on boo, i know many players who dont play tourneys anymore couse of this,instead they only play teams whit players they know.
So to say that cheeting dont harm Bridge is just silly.

kenneth

[luke warm]

bglover, on Sep 7 2003, 04:54 PM, said:

FWIW I use all those products... I have never had an infection in all the years I've used Zone alarm and AVG (grisofts antivirus program).

I have used Norton and McAfee antivirus programs in the past and have found that AVG catches more than either of them AND IT IS FREE.

Matter of fact, caught an email bug this morning.

i use all of those also, as well as adaware (it's a decent program that catches a lot of things that slip thru the crack)

i kinda agree with richard, in that i don't waste a lot of time worrying about people cheating... they either will or they won't, and i doubt i can do anything about it... besides, i have too much to worry about with truscott 2♦ and spiral scan

[csdenmark]

Quote

how can u say that? offcourse it harms someone, everybody how played in that tourney foresure, they got a score they never should have. and it harms everyone who plays on boo, i know many players who dont play tourneys anymore couse of this,instead they only play teams whit players they know.
So to say that cheeting dont harm Bridge is just silly.

There are so many tournaments and really many with no serious set-up.
Tournaments are just an alternative set-up of social bridge play. If the tournaments was meant as serious competition you would see important features implemented for that. Those are missing today.

All those many persons just jumping from one tourney into another one dont take them as a serious contests. Kenneth I am very sorry if you think they are more serious than other players think.

[helium]

I dont take it more serius than a robbergame whit friends,
But i have to say its sad to read ur post clas,i really hope u have more respekt for the game and bbo than it souned like in ur post,its thinking like that that ruin this game,
its sounds like you have no etichs att all.
sad really sad

kenneth

[the hog]

Kenneth,
Claus is not saying that cheating doesn't harm bridge. He is saying "what does it matter if some petty sad individual has to boost his own ego by getting a good result". I for one happen to agree with him. Really does your life depend on it; is it life threatening; will you not gain National representation because of it? Surely we all have more important things to worry about in this world than some sad individual. To say Claus really "has no ethics at all" is a very insulting comment.

[helium]

no i think u missunderstod me, i dint say clas dint have etich but when he say that no one got harmed in the spesiffikk exsample is sad to hear.
dint not mean to insult anyone, and i apologise if it soundet insulting.

kenneth

[the hog]

dint not mean to insult anyone, and i apologise if it soundet insulting.

No problems. Misunderstanding all round.
Ron

[spwdo]

hi,


maybe a possibilty in the set-up(format) to allow " kibits on partner only" when dummy en then combined with kibitzers not allowed woud be a way to at least have a possibilty to host tourneys were it woud be less likely to play unethical in,Nothing is waterproof off course but this coud be a first step in making it harder to cheat. Maybe im wrong and it doesnt help also, i dont know.must confess i havent given this much thought while i believe that all this thinking , talking about cheating encourages the not that confident people to go "protect"themselves against "all this cheating" by doing it themselves. I get great proud feelings when i get a positife score in i field that by far outreache me in playing skills, when i come in with a score below average im only looking more at movies and travellers to see where i went wrong or where to do better. this weeks abalucys game i came and incredible(for my standards) 4the place(should have won wasnt that i bid and played a very bad 3nt-4), a "friendly"kibitzer( like someone said it) there woud have made victory very reacheble but at what cost? seeing my name on top and taking away my pleasure,proudness and "yessssssssss" feeling that i had with my fair fourth place just doesnt seem worth it

marc

[csdenmark]

What is bridge? The ability for one person to communicate precisely with another person using 37 commands for deciding which of millions of combinations of the 52 cards which are on the run this time. The quality of your system and yourself to master this is what to be meassured. - As all too many just play private systems/interpretations with insufficient definitions they will just miss the point of bridge. - Fascinating I think!

This also means - cheaters can only ruin the fun for themselves - not for others.

In the example Ben has mentioned - an accusation for cheating makes no sense. If they really wanted to cheat - they would of course see to that everything looks like normal standard. This means CUE or asking from the strong hand which here clearly will be able to count a slam. Therefore I cannot see it in any other way than those who likes to see the '4NT' bid as cheating are just seeing ghosts in daylight.

I like to see actions to be taken against those who are spoiling my fun of the game. That is those who cannot master their own system and those who are leaving the game. To leave a table sucking into a tournament is a major violation and by no means it differs from those just leaving the table for no reason at all.

Dealing with rules the word 'consequence' is a crucial word. Arbitrarian decisions are unacceptable!

[uday]

There is plenty of merit in CSDenmark's positon. But I think that cheaters also spoil the fun for others. A risky systemic preempt that cannot succeed because the opps know both hands is no fun. You can't find out if your system is working or not working. Deceptive plays or bids , psychics, nothing affects the result on most hands (result is now predetermined by the cheaters ideas of what is correct on each hand)

So cheaters are definitely members of the class of people that spoil the fun for others.

[kleek]

Thank you all for your various statements regarding online cheating. Everybody is entitled to their own views on the subject, and this variety of views is what makes the Bridge Base Forum so valuable to the online bridge community.

I recently struck up a casual partnership here at BBO with a 13-year-old novice who is very intent on learning to play bridge. The last time I got to play with this person, there was only time to play a few hands, so we opened a table in the Main Bridge Club. Before relating the particulars of what happened, I would like to say first that it was obvious to me that our opponents were not novices or beginners. In fact, it appeared to me that they had considerable experience playing bridge, which made what I am about to describe seem all the more bizarre to me.

The first hand that got my suspicion aroused was when one of the opponents opened a weak 2S on basically King sixth and out, and his partner (playing IMP's please keep in mind!) competed to 3S with a singleton spot spade and a number of, as it turned out, well-positioned cards. We took the push to the 4-level, got doubled, and got a very bad result. It struck me as very odd, to say the least, that someone would attempt to "push" us up a level with a rather non-descript hand containing only a singleton spade and a not overwhelming number of HCP. After reviewing the lie of all of the cards, I realized that this rather absurdly and dangerously bid 3S contract (missing AQJ10xx in spades) was cold on any defense. Among other well-positioned cards, the outstanding spades were split 3-3, with the AQJ onside, holding their spade losers to two. Hmmm...the opponent's bid seems to have been unusually lucky and safe, doesn't it? But they were just warming up.

A couple of hands later, my RHO this time overcalled a weak 2S, and my partner and I overbid to the 5-level for another bad result, which we fairly earned and deserved. What I found to be somewhat odd about this hand, after reviewing the position of the cards, was that the person who overcalled 2S held Q109, xxx, xxx, xxxx AND that his partner, over a 3H call by me, NEVER did anything but PASS for the entire auction, holding Kxxxx, Ax, xx, Axxx! Would any of you pass a 2S overcall by partner holding this hand? Well, they weren't in too much trouble in 2S, were they? Odd, to say the least.

The final insult came when my partner and I bid unopposed to 6NT, and my LHO, out of the clear blue sky, doubled us. As it turned out, there was no way to make 6NT on any lead, and once again we had earned our bad result, but the double had piqued my interest. The person who doubled 6NT held xx, Qxxxx, x, Qxxxx. Now, with the opponents freely bidding unopposed to 6NT, does this look like a penalty double of 6NT to any of you? But, alas, 6NT had no play. Seem a little strange?

Now I can handle playing against the occasional cheater(s), even when it is as blatantly obvious as in the above examples. I will simply add those opponents' names to my growing group of black-listed names of players that I will never again knowingly play against in the future. But what lessons do you think that my novice partner came away from the table with? When people are first learning to play, they can be semi-isolated in novice and beginner games, but when certain beginners seem to show some promise, we encourage them to get out there and play against the "better" players. We claim that this is the best, and the fastest, road to learning more about the game and improving one's skills. In this kind of environment, is it really?

I suppose you can count me among the group that thinks every reasonable effort should be made by everyone to rid the online bridge community of those players who feel it necessary (and enjoyable) to cheat at the game. Although the growth and success of online bridge may ultimately prove to be the salvation of the game we all enjoy so much, if there is one issue that could foreshadow its failure, it is how well or poorly it does in handling the ethics/cheating problems. They should not be ignored.