Carlsen–Niemann controversy

Introduction

During the Sinquefield Cup in September 2022, a controversy arose involving the chess grandmasters Magnus Carlsen, then world champion, and Hans Niemann. Carlsen, after surprisingly losing in their third-round matchup, dropped out of the tournament. Many interpreted his withdrawal as Carlsen accusing Niemann of having cheated. In their next tournament meetup, an online tournament, Carlsen resigned after one move, confuse observers again. It became the most serious scandal about cheating allegations in chess in recent years, and it gathered significant attention in the news media worldwide.

Escalating conflict.

Actions from FIDE.

 FIDE disapprove Carlsen for his actions but at the same time acknowledged his concerns about cheating in chess and later announced an investigation into Carlsen's claims of alleged cheating and Niemann's response.

Actions from chess.com.

Chess.com removed Niemann from their platform in the days after Carlsen's withdrawal from the Sinquefield Cup and released an interim report summarising their evaluation of Niemann's games and their estimation of his online cheating on their platform. Many chess players and journalists commented on the issue, some supporting Carlsen's suspicions in one way or another, others criticizing him for his tournament withdrawal and for making allegations without producing evidence.

Lawsuit.

On October 20, 2022, Niemann filed a lawsuit against Carlsen, his company Play Magnus Group, Chess.com, Chess.com's Chief Chess Officer Daniel Rensch, and the grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura for defamation and unlawful collusion. The complaint contained allegations that statements in the Chess.com report had falsely accused Niemann of a more extensive history of cheating in the past than he had publicly admitted, and further alleged that those statements were part of a malicious conspiracy to defame Niemann. The lawsuit however was dismissed on June 27, 2023.

Other opinions.

Some expressed the belief that Niemann had not cheated in his game against Carlsen. Most commentators expressed their desire for strict and consistent cheating controls in chess tournaments. The executive director of the Saint Louis Chess Club (host of the Sinquefield Cup), Tony Rich, said in a statement that "a player's decision to withdraw from a tournament is a personal decision, and we respect Magnus's choice." Rich later elaborated that no formal complaint was made in writing. Later in the tournament, Chief Arbiter Chris Bird published a statement affirming that there was "no indication that any player has been playing unfairly" during the Sinquefield Cup. Bird's statement did not address the reason to add additional security measures after Carlsen's withdrawal. Even so, the organisers increased measures of metal detection on the players and introduced a 15-minute broadcast delay for the next rounds of the tournament. The SLCC organisers permanently upgraded their anti-cheating measures for future events, including nonlinear junction detectors to detect silicon in electronics, a radio frequency machine to detect infrared signals, and a 30-minute broadcast delay for the duration of the U.S. Chess Championships. FIDE upgraded their anti-cheating measures for the FIDE World Fischer Random Chess Championship 2022. This included a medical doctor to inspect the ears of players for any transmitters, and confiscating the electronics of spectators. Two days after the game, French grandmaster Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, a participant in the 2022 Sinquefield Cup and the reigning World Blitz Champion, expressed concern that the developing drama was becoming a "witch hunt". He did not think that Niemann had cheated. Laurent Fressinet, second of Carlsen in all his World Chess Championship matches, revealed "Few months ago, I met Hans in Paris, MVL was playing a blitz match with him, it was very close and MVL won in armageddon. Then, he played with Jules Moussard, I can tell you he would kick our arse in blitz without any problems that's for sure." After the event, Ian Nepomniachtchi commented that he had asked the St. Louis organisers for additional anti-cheating measures once he heard Niemann would be playing in the event Fabiano Caruana mentioned that Carlsen was already "upset" about Niemann's inclusion and had considered leaving before the tournament began. This was later confirmed by Carlsen in a statement released September 26. Christopher Yoo called for more accountability for Niemann's past actions. Many members of the chess community expressed their views after Carlsen released his statement. Some who expressed their support for Carlsen were Nakamura, Romain Édouard, R. B. Ramesh, Srinath Narayanan, and Andrew Tang, who praised him for taking a principled stance and forcing a public discussion on cheating in chess. Others were more critical of Carlsen's handling of the matter. Maurice Ashley, Daniel King, and Ben Finegold questioned his need for Niemann's permission if he did have evidence, and criticized him for dropping insinuations without providing any evidence. Raymond Keene stated that Niemann could seek legal counsel, citing Nona Gaprindashvili's Netflix defamation case. Sergey Karjakin criticized current anti-cheat measures but maintained that no proof so far had been established against Niemann. Garry Kasparov said he understood Carlsen's "frustration", but that leaving the Sinquefield Cup was unacceptable without any evidence of Niemann cheating. Dutch chess commentator Tim Krabbé published a satirical comment "Carlsen caught at cheating", foiling Carlsen's statement "I had the impression that he wasn't tense or even fully concentrating on the game" with a photo of Carlsen in a nap-like relaxing pose at the board. Viswanathan Anand, speaking about the controversy, said that the moves of the game did not suggest to him that Niemann was cheating, that he keeps an open mind, that he does not make claims he cannot prove, and that proof of cheating will be difficult if not impossible to produce. He asked, "I don't know, am I naïve, or are my colleagues paranoid?". Many called on FIDE to investigate the controversy. Nakamura and Daniel Naroditsky commented that there should be clear agreements among online platforms and FIDE on the subject of cheating. Leonard Barden, The Guardian's chess columnist, asked FIDE to act. Nigel Davies criticized Carlsen for not releasing evidence, and called for the FIDE Ethics Commission to step in.

Cheating allegations against Niemann.

Grandmaster and streamer Hikaru Nakamura said he believed Carlsen had likely suspected Niemann of cheating because Niemann had previously been banned from Chess.com for cheating in online chess games. Levon Aronian, a grandmaster who was playing in the Sinquefield Cup, initially defended Niemann, stating that most high-level players are "pretty much paranoid" and that young players often draw accusations of cheating after strong play. A week later, Aronian stated that he "really didn't know much about a lot of things" and now finds himself "somewhere in the middle". He added, "I do believe Hans has not been the cleanest person when it comes to online chess. "According to an anonymous source cited by the Wall Street Journal, Niemann's poor performance in Miami in August 2022, both at the eight-person FTX Crypto Cup (where Niemann had some strong games but lost every series) and in an informal beachside game against Carlsen, played a role in Carlsen's suspicions. Nakamura agreed that Miami seemed to play a role in Carlsen's thinking, stating that "When you combine (the poor Miami performances) with the long-existing rumors, Carlsen became convinced something was off."

Niemann's denial.

In an interview on September 6, 2022, Niemann denied having cheated during the Sinquefield Cup and accused Carlsen, Nakamura, and Chess.com of attempting to ruin his career. He admitted that he had previously cheated in "multiple games" on Chess.com; first, when he was 12 years old during an online tournament and again when he was 16 years old in unrated online games. But he still maintained that he had never cheated in an over-the-board game. In response to unsubstantiated speculation alleging the involvement of a concealed device during the Sinquefield Cup, he offered to play in a closed environment without electronic connections and said "if they want me to strip fully naked, I will do it," to disprove any allegations of cheating. PlayMagnus.com published an article in response with the list of "The Biggest Cheating Scandals in Chess" with an accompanying meme "How did you beat Magnus Carlsen? Chess speaks for itself. What did it cost you? Everything" which was subsequently deleted from their social media accounts.

Carlsen's response.

On September 26, Carlsen posted his official statement regarding the controversy on Twitter. He confirmed that he had considered withdrawing from the Sinquefield Cup due to Niemann's last-minute inclusion. Carlsen stated that he believed that Niemann cheated more often and more recently than he had publicly admitted, and that Niemann's unusual over the board progress coupled with him "not being tense or even fully concentrating" during their Sinquefield Cup game had convinced him to withdraw from the tournament. He stated that he was limited in what he could say openly without "explicit permission from Niemann" but went on to say that he does not want to play against people who have repeatedly cheated in the past, and that his actions make it clear that he is not willing to play chess with Niemann. 

Aftermath

In 2024, Carlsen and Niemann played three online games against each other during the span of several Titled Tuesday events on Chess.com. Carlsen scored 2.5/3 in those games. In the 2024 FIDE World Rapid and Blitz Team Championships, Carlsen's team WR Chess was paired four times in total against the team GMHans.com. Carlsen sat out all four matches, thus avoiding an over the board encounter with Niemann on board 1. Carlsen and Niemann next played again in the Speed Chess Championship on September 6, 2024 in Paris. Though the match was held in person, the games were played on a computer over Chess.com. The match consisted of three sections with different time controls. Carlsen won the 5+1 portion 7-2, while the remaining sections were tied at 4-4 and 6.5-6.5, thus giving Carlsen the win 17.5-12.5. Carlsen then proceeded to the final against Alireza Firouzja, which he won with a dominant 23.5-7.5 score. Niemann was later beaten 9-21 in the third place match against Nakamura.

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