Chess Cheating:
Feller Codes







Feller Coding is a "natural" way of cheating in chess with computer help. It works best at team matches on four or more boards which are live transmitted via the internet. The cheater is one of the eight players involved. Let us call him P. P has two helpers, called A and B.

Helper A is "working" outside of the tournament hall. He has internet access (with the live transmission of the event), a strong chess program running and a mobile phone. When P is to move, A finds a strong move for P with help of the computer program and transmits this move by SMS to comrade B who has also a mobile phone and is in the tournament hall, near the table of the match of player P.

When B receives a move, he translates it in classical correspondence chess notation (for instance "5242" for e2-e4). In case of 5254, B transmits that move to P secretly by first standing behind player 5 for a few seconds, then behind player 2 for a few seconds, then behind player 5 for a few seconds, and finally behind player 4 for a few seconds.

In the Chess Olympiad 2010 in Chanty-Mansijsk, the procedure worked so well for "trick" master Sebastien Feller that he achieved a gold medal for his computer-helped strong performance. Only after the Olympiad the cheating became known - and Feller lost the Gold medal. According to this event, this way to transmit chess moves is called "Feller Code" or "Feller Coding".




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