Did Hikaru Nakamura cheat online?

Author: Maria Fragaki

Of course Hikaru Nakamura is cheating! He is not only the most successful chess streamer, World No.3 in classical chess, and World No.2 in blitz, but also a smart businessman, and happily married! He must have been cheating to be that accomplished, don’t you think? Let’s unwrap the new chess drama between Hikaru Nakamura, Vladimir Kramnik, and chesscom, but for the same old reasons; cheating!

Magnus Carlsen vs Hans Niemann

The chess world was rocked when Magnus Carlsen withdrew from the Sinquefield Cup last autumn after losing to Hans Niemann, whom he later accused of cheating in online games. The controversy escalated as Hikaru Nakamura supported Carlsen’s claims in a video stream, and Chesscom reported Niemann’s history of using unauthorized computer assistance. Niemann admitted to online cheating but denied it in over-the-board games. A public debate ensued, with divided opinions and conflicting expert analyses. The situation intensified when Niemann sued Carlsen, Nakamura, and Chess.com for $100 million, leading to a partial dismissal and eventual settlement, concluding the high-profile dispute.

Vladimir Kramnik vs Hans Niemann

Former World Champion Vladimir Kramnik recently faced Hans Niemann in an online tournament on chesscom and suffered a surprising defeat in the Berlin Defence. Unconvinced of the fairness of the match, Kramnik, playing with black in the next game, protested by making unconventional moves (1.e4 f6 2.d4 g5) against Niemann, who chose to resign rather than accept the mate offer.

In response to Vladimir Kramnik’s implicit accusations of unfair play in their online match, Hans Niemann took a proactive approach and offered to undergo a personal training session with Kramnik, suggesting that such an interaction could serve as an opportunity for Kramnik to assess Niemann’s understanding of chess.

Kramnik’s concern though extends beyond him. The chess veteran believes that online tournaments, particularly the ‘Titled Tuesday’ series on chesscom, are prone to a high degree of cheating.

Hikaru Nakamura hits the highest ever blitz rating on Chesscom

On the 13th of November, GM Hikaru Nakamura has set new records for the highest blitz rating on Chesscom, surpassing the longstanding mark of 3332 twice within a short period. Nakamura achieved ratings of 3334 and 3336 during live streaming sessions on Kick, just before winning his 42nd Titled Tuesday crown in the double-tournament era.

Hikaru Nakamura vs Vladimir Kramnik

Surpassing his own blitz record was one thing, but scoring 45,5 out of 46 consecutive 3-minute blitz games against players with a 2950 average rating, which leads to a 3600+ performance, is a whole new level of online chess awesomeness! These statistics caught Kramnik’s attention, who found them interesting!

As GM Eric Hansen mentioned in his stream, “interesting” is an invitation to investigate Hikaru on cheating online. So it’s clearly an accusation.

In this accusation, Hikaru responded in his stream saying that Kramnik has clearly lost his mind, but also he won 43 blitz chess games in a row, live on stream, and later he won chesscom’s Bullet Brawl score for the third time in a row with 73 wins!

On November 29th Chesscom released an official statement saying that they have found no incidents of Hikaru cheating after generating nearly 2,000 individual reports on Hikaru’s games in their Fair Play system.

Vladimir Kramnik vs Chesscom

“Calling my recent efforts to help improve anti-cheating efficiency of chess.com platform ‘accusations of Hikaru Nakamura by Vladimir Kramnik’ is a clear public disinformation. In case it [chesscom apologising to him for labeling his concerns to be accusations] is not done within 24 hours from the moment this post is published on my blog on chess.com I will start a legal case against chess.com next week latest after the consultation with my lawyers.” the former World Champion wrote after the report has being released, with Nakamura responding: “I don’t care what Kramnik has said, threats are not okay. Period. But trying to hold Chess.com accountable for what someone says on a platform that has hundreds of millions of users, first of all, is very strange. [...] Who does this guy think he is?”

Is this ever going to end?