Is there a time-cheat?

This is something I have noticed so many times and makes me feel really suspicious.

I play a 5-minute game (pure 5 minutes not 5 +1 or +2 or whatever) and I reach a point when my opponent is in real time trouble with few seconds left for him while my time is more than triple his time, so I start playing really quickly with the hope that his flag will soon fall. BUT

To my disappointment, his time reaches 2 seconds and suddenly raises above 5, and then again and then again until I end up losing by time myself.

This is really frustrating and happened using different devices (PC, Tablet, mobile, etc) and I have very fast reliable internet connection in Switzerland. This happened with the previous version and repeated with this one.

I wonder if anybody else encountered this problem or is it just me.

I strongly suspect that premium members have some kind of privilage, but this is pure cheating.

What else could it be?

The support FAQ is down right now but you are seeing a mixture of lag compensation and disconnects.

https://support.chess.com/customer/en/portal/articles/1444918-my-internet-connection-is-fine---why-am-i-getting-disconnects-

I have noticed the same thing many times. Its really frustrating. There is no issue with internet connection. There is another thread on internet connection issue which is valid. There when you lose connection, it feels like the opponent is not playing and when you get the connection back, you have lost the time. In this case, the opponent clearly gains some time. This is definitely an issue and would be good to know the reason behind it.

Having a good internet connection does not mean that your connection to Live can't have issues. The traffic only shares some of the same path and there are processes on your local system or network that can force data loss, packet resends, and process disconnects.

How does your computer, after you make the move, make the image after the move appear instantly on your opponent’s computer?

Your computer, the server, and your opponent’s computer are not connected at the speed of light

The reason the time increases is that there are three timekeeping devices - your computer, your opponent's computer, and the server.

When you make your move, you see your opponent's time start going down instantly (because it is your computer's clock that is moving it).  However, it takes some time before your opponent's clock on your opponent's computer starts going down, because they have to wait for the move to make it first to the server and then to their computer.  Normally, this amount of time is very small.  But, if there is a lot of lag, then it may be a few seconds - seconds that your computer is counting against them.  When the server returns their move to you, it also sends an updated time that your opponent actually spent, which causes your opponent's clock on your computer to go back up.

It's not a conspiracy and it's not "time cheating," it's just your computer getting the corrected time.

Using timestamp doesn't change the fact that the client clocks have to be updated after each move and those updates will mostly add time to the opponent's clock on the local client, though with low lag it would be minimal.

The explanation is not correct at all.

It is not a matter of time lag. My opponents time is already on 2 seconds and it jumps back to 5 or 6 seconds

and again

and again

until finally my time ends before his

This is definitely a time cheat

Your opponent might be using satallite internet, so that will add cause a lot of lag. It takes time to send a move to a satallite in geosynchronious orbit then back down to earth.

Also, even with normal broadband, if there is a major outtage, a lot of traffic will be competing for a different internet route. After 15 hops, IP packets expire, so the computer has to resend the packet. Eventually the internet sorts out and optimize the flow to accommodate the broken link, but it can take several minutes or even longer to optimize the  rerouting of packets.

If you look at the game in your archive, you can see the official server time stamps. You will see that the time never actually increased, unless it was an increment time control. The client code updates the clocks to the correct time, which means you can see increases.

I really feel like I am arguning with Muslims about the Quran.

I do not care what excuses you can give for this mistake.

You have a software that is supposed to work correctly. My time and my opponent time both work fine up until we reach a critical point where he is running out of time (last few seconds) while I still have comparatively plenty of time. All of a sudden his time jumps to a little higher value and then continues decreasing, then just about reaching zero it jumps again to higher value... This repeats three times or more, Meanwhile, my time is running down as usual, until I end up losing by timeout.

This is ridiculous and I cannot accept all your acrobatic excuses. And by the way, I am an IT consultant myself, so it's not like I don't get what you are talking about.

No, Sir. Something is wrong and you need to fix it. It should never happen again.

And by the way, at the end of the game, I would like to be able to see the whole game along with the timestamps. Maybe this is possible but I'm not aware of it, but it is important.

Thank you for your care and attention.

You can see the game timestamps in the archive. It is actually the computed time taken per move, though the site may also keep the full log on the backend, which would only be available to them.

The client code might need work to be more robust, but the fact is that the server keeps the official times, and because of lag compenstion and potential disconnects, you can, and will, see time increases like that in games. 

I know of one time cheat, but I don't recommend using it because it can be dangerous...

htpps://gurushots.com/photo/40adfb1e1b1156343c4e14285fba0e0b

lol

I was not looking for a time cheat. I suspect that chess.com sometimes cheats the time during a game in a critical moment in order to favor one player over another. Maybe to favor a paid member over a non-paid member.

What happened in many of my blitz games raises my suspitions on this matter.

That doesn't happen. The main difference between a basic and premium member is the advertisement code isn't there so premium members have a little less load.

There is no such thing as a time cheat. As Martin_Stahl mentioned above, it's just connection. Also, like the person above me wrote, that would be impossible to create a stable one; and from what I understand, this happens with multiple different people.

A player making premoves could potentially make up to 20 moves in 2 seconds. The game in the archive will easily show if that is the case since premoves take 0.1 second each.

You have to turn them on in the Live chess settings. If you are on mobile there is a limit to one premove at a time, unless something recently changed. On the website, you can stack at least 5 moves; the help article says 5 but I think that changed and is more now.

https://support.chess.com/article/642-what-are-premoves-and-how-do-they-work

I would think if it happens with various opponents, then the issue lies with you. If it happens with one opponent, stop playing him.