Turkey Uses AI and Other Tech to Claw Back 100 Looted Antiquities from the US

Turkey’s Culture Ministry took a victory lap at the Istanbul Archaeological Museums on Monday, presenting some 200 cultural artifacts that it reclaimed from the US, reports Anadolu Ajansı. The event also marked the opening of the show “No Escape: Boubon,” spotlighting Turkey’s efforts to combat the unlawful trafficking of cultural heritage.

A focus of the presentation was bronze statues from the ancient city of Boubon in Burdur, southwestern Turkey. The site was illegally excavated in the 1960s, the statues dismantled and scattered among various countries. Excavations at the site resumed in 2023 and are ongoing.

The greatest number of artifacts, some 44, were terracotta architectural panels from Duver in Burdur, dating to 700–480 BCE. There were also 40 artifacts from the Horoztepe archaeological site, in Tokat province, a portrait from the ancient city of Aphrodisias, and theatrical masks and goddess statuettes.

In attendance were Turkey’s culture minister, Mehmet Nuri Ersoy, and Manhattan district attorney Matthew Bogdanos. New York’s Antiquities Trafficking Unit (ATU) has recovered some 6,452 looted antiquities, said Bogdanos, including 276 originating from Turkey. Bogdanos established the ATU in 2017.

Last year, the Cleveland Museum of Art agreed to surrender a statue of Marcus Aurelius to be repatriated to Turkey. The ATU had at that time seized 15 looted antiquities from Boubon, 14 of which had been repatriated, collectively valued at almost $80 million.

Three technologies were used in the effort to recover the 100 objects unveiled Monday, reports Tech Times. Lead isotope geochemistry can prove where ancient bronze was smelted. Geometric mold-matching determines whether a sculpture belonged to a specific pedestal. And an AI platform called TraceART scans global auction sites and social media for trafficked Turkish objects. The Ministry of Culture and Tourism developed TraceART and began using it in 2025. Items flagged by the AI are reviewed by experts. One early hit: two 16th-century Iznik tiles clawed back from a UK auction house just this year.

Included in the exhibition are four portraits of Roman emperors whose statues once stood at Boubon’s Sebasteion, a monumental display dedicated to the Roman imperial family, notes Tech Times. The bronze sculptures, looted and broken apart in the 1960s, had found their way to US institutions including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Cleveland Museum of Art, and the J. Paul Getty Museum. The objects were connected to the ancient site through lead isotope analysis; matching the statues’ feet to imprints in the pedestals; and research by professors and the work of journalists including Turkey’s Özgen Acar as well as Graham Bowley and Tom Mashberg of the New York Times.

The handover on Monday traces back to when an American auction house listed Anatolian artifacts for sale. When Turkey’s Ministry of Culture flagged them and made a case to the Manhattan District Attorney and US Department of Homeland Security Investigations, the items were returned.

Turkey achieved the repatriation of some 180 cultural artifacts in 2025 alone, notes Tech Times, bringing the total since 1980 to more than 26,700. The ministry is still pursuing an ancient marble torso called the Old Fisherman, in the holdings of the Altes Museum in Berlin, and dozens of Iznik tiles residing at the Louvre, in Paris.

“We will keep tracing cultural artifacts illegally taken from Anatolia and working to bring them back to their rightful home through scientific, legal and diplomatic efforts,” said Ersoy on Monday.