Hello, Codeforces!
In the awesome new MaraTON Challenge 1, which lasted 21 days, I noticed some very suspicious activity. It caught my attention, and I wanted to share my observations.
What Happened?
Day 20:
A new account (Handle: onyeo) made its first submission. This account:
- Is a friend of one user,
- Used the "magic tool" to mark itself as Legendary Grandmaster, and
- Registered three weeks ago [Contest also started 3 weeks ago].
After submitting two compilation errors, they suddenly submitted a brilliant solution within 10 minutes, landing them 15th place!
Mmm... fine, maybe they were working offline and didn’t want to test progress on real cases. Suspicious, but plausible.
24 hours later:
Another account (Handle: aliqi) who:
- Is a friend of one user,
- Used the magic tool to mark itself as Legendary Grandmaster, and
- Registered three months ago (to join a Div. 3 contest).
After they made a few weak submissions, they dropped another brilliant solution—landing 16th, right below the previous account.
At this point, I thought this was Weird and maybe I'd write a clarification to the judges.
Two Hours Later:
As I was preparing my clarification, guess what? Yes! another account (Handle: frag_) appeared!
- Registered three weeks ago
They submitted a memory-limit solution and followed up with a brilliant solution that landed between the previous accounts.
Now the standings were: onyeo (15th), frag_ (16th), and aliqi (17th).
30 Minutes Later (Two Hours Before the Contest Ends):
Another account (Handle: kvtan) joined the party!
- A friend of one user,
- Used the magic tool to mark itself as Grandmaster, and
- Registered three weeks ago.
After submitting a couple of weak solutions, they landed next to the previous accounts. Then they followed with other submissions climbing to 13th!
After that, there was around 1 hour left to the end of the hackathon and they all stayed on top-20.
My Interpretation
It seems that one or two original users (already holding high ranks) submitted weaker solutions using fake/inactive accounts to secure extra prizes. All solutions showed similar time and memory usage, except for frag_. I’m unsure whether it belongs to the same cheater, a different cheater, or is innocent, as their approach slightly differed.
Also, the '(friend of 1 user)' detail is likely a master account that added all the other accounts as friends, to be able to track them in the 'friends standings'.
Final Thoughts
I’ve had an amazing experience in this challenge and am satisfied with my rank. But I hate to see cheaters taking prizes or spots away from deserving participants.
I already sent a clarification during the contest to the judges, but I'm not sure if they received it or not, this is why I'm writing this. I kindly ask the judges and MikeMirzayanov to investigate this and skip/ban any cheaters.
I also ask you to tell me — does this look suspicious to you, or has the Sherlock Holmes rewatch taken over my brain? :D
Thanks for reading!
Sussy Baka!
Haters!
Unbelievable!
That's very bad, now I understand what happened there.
I hope this gets dealt with
I hope this to be considered as I think it is unfair.
I hope this gets investigated ASAP
So predictable that some people will try to cheat and it proves cheating doesn't depend on rank.
We need to see an action on this.
Hope they skip them and someone to look into this !
They should investigate this and potentially create a contest to find a method that catches cheaters!
I don't know what happened but it's strange that I have to be on this list just because I registered 3 weeks ago. I think your guess makes some sense but is not all correct. Contestants use local testing and submit the code last so as not to provoke other competitors. You seem to not know every detail of the contest. Anyway, I'll wait for the result. Thanks for the contest.
I found that you are on rank 24 now and you need to find 4 cheaters to be successful.
BUT don't easily dismiss other people's efforts with your own assumptions. After all, you chose a blog because you couldn't win with your coding.
I think they are hundreds but they solve a few number of problems to not open an eye on them,
as a newbie it's weird that: 1:30 5100 solved C, 1:42 7200 solved C!!
It's wrong to make this as a public perspective but also important to be careful...
git gud instead bro
Hi! This is my first and only account here. I didn't even know about codeforces existence before MaraTON Challenge, so of course I registered after it started. I am not competitive programmer, but I have some background in data compression, and it's not the first compression contest for me. I had little time, and most of the code was written in the last two days. I tested code locally. Used plain C, so it's likely to look quite different from other entries. Hope it helps.