chess.com suggests Hans cheated more than he admits. He did (much?) better in tournaments with zero delay. In a few consecutive tournaments, he made a lot of top engine moves, slightly above Magnus/Kasparov/Fisher at their best. He had a hard time explaining his lines in the interview after the game (with Firouzja I think).

The analysis of him doing better in broadcast/non-broadcast games was flawed, the analysis mis-categorized several of the tournaments in a way that made the conclusion stronger.

Thanks, I missed that information.

I would say there is more than a cheating history and a single game that triggered Magnus. However, most of it has a possible explanation. Like, I would be very nervous if you put me in front of a camera at 19 years. Are these arguments together strong enough? Hard to judge.

Let the chess speak for itself... because I sure can't explain it!

> Hans is known to have cheated

Do you have a link to this? Proof that this player has cheated in the past would be the strongest evidence, I believe, he'd do so again.

This is not disputed, he has admitted to it himself:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oU6UJz_X8DU

He admitted to having previously cheated. The admission happened during the Sinquefeld cup, on stream, during the event.

Having cheated in prior history is not a question, but the extent and recency of the behavior is.

I don't know if there's data but people who have cheated in the past often seem to cheat in the future. Having watched some videos about the state of speed-running video games lately intersected with how gambling cheaters seems to never stop cheating supports that.

He admits to cheating in the video linked below. However, that's when he was 12 (and 16) and his friend helped. It is much more different situation then anal beads or electronics in your shoe.

Disclaimer: don't know much about chess, let alone professional chess.

Also his coach was caught cheating in a titled tournament on chess.com

And chess.com and Magnus have disputed that Hans has admitted to all of the times he has cheated.

Then they should just provide evidence instead of allegations. Innocent until proven guilty.

The fundamental asummetry at play here is that cheating is a lot easier than detecting cheaters in modern chess. As such, I'm not sure insisting on people shutting up unless they can provide ironclad evidence won't just lead to professional chess becoming rife with cheaters (which is presumably the "existential threat" to proffessional chess that Carlsen reffers to in his statement).

I admit that it is a trickly problem, and I agree that Carlsen's behavior here is not beyond reproach. Withdrawing from the tournament only after having lost a game makes the statement much less impactfull since one can not discount the possibility that he's just being a rather sore looser. I would personally have respected his decision much more if he had followed his impulse (again, referred to in his statement) to withdraw as soon as Niemann had been invited to the tournament in the first place.

Niemann during an interview admitted to having cheated in the past