A new app aims to help save critically endangered sea turtles

Artificial intelligence can spot illicit tortoiseshell with greater ease—a new frontier in the fight against the the illegal wildlife trade. With its durability and transfixing swirl of translucent amber and brown layers, tortoiseshell has been used for centuries to make everything from jewelry to combs to dishware. “It was plastic before plastic was invented because it’s so malleable,” says Brad Nahill, co-founder and president of turtle conservation group SEE Turtles and a National Geographic Explorer. Named SEE Shell, the app uses machine learning to identify with 94 percent accuracy whether a photo of something with a tortoiseshell pattern is real or faux. It’s the first mobile app to use computer vision to combat the illegal wildlife trade, according to Alexander Robillard, a predoctoral fellow with the Smithsonian’s Data Science Lab who built the computer model that powers it, and it will help inform conservation-minded shoppers and law enforcement. “Even if we get a few hundred travelers actively using it and collecting data and avoiding buying real tortoiseshell, it’s a great thing,” Nahill says. SEE Turtles plans to market the free app through social media campaigns and partnerships with other conservation organizations.