Crowdsourcing Antiquities Crime Fighting

In early 2017, Sarah Parcak used her $1 million TED Prize to build the GlobalXplorer degrees platform (https://www.globalxplorer.org) "to identify and quantify looting and encroachment to sites of archaeological and historical importance," using a crowdsourced "citizen science" methodology popularized by the Zooniverse web portal. GlobalXplorer degrees invited the public to search satellite imagery from Peru for evidence of looting within 100 m x 100 m squares, training them along the way and gamifying participation. In this review, I test the platform and consider the applicability of GlobalXplorer degrees as a vector for changing the way that the general public perceives the global illicit trade in cultural objects.