There are days when Ross Davison feels as if people just aren't taking him seriously. The other day he was supposed to explain to a couple of guys what the future of their jobs is going to look like. It was a workshop in Indiana. There were students—engineers, historians, archaeologists—and Davison, a 26-year-old surfer-boy from Santa Cruz who only just graduated from university, one of those smart-asses who studied something quirky with underwater measurement.

"When we first met, they were so sure that I didn't have the slightest idea about what work really is," he remembers. But those experts, they underestimated their teacher. Not for nothing does Davison offer his classes in Iraq, Lebanon, and Afghanistan: there, people yearn to learn what he knows. His last lecture in Pakistan was packed, 30 people squeezed into the classroom.

Most of them were researchers from the region, students, and activists. People who know the place, locals. "They couldn’t wait to use the tools I showed them," says Davison. "One student proposed that we should secure an archaeological excavation site right away. The place is controlled by militias of the fundamentalist Taliban almost all year round."

Cultural guardians

The student who proclaimed this idea is part of a new generation of cultural guardians who are starting to make a name for themselves around the world as the digital "Monuments Men." Originally the Monuments Men were a group of people, most of them with a cultural studies background, who joined a special branch of the US Army for one reason only: to save and retrieve stolen art from the Nazis. The goal of the digital Monuments Men today is no less important: they want to save global culture from destruction.

As a member of CyArk, Davison is providing tech and knowledge to those on-the-ground experts. The non-profit organisation has dedicated itself to digitising the UNESCO World Heritage sites. Within five years it plans to scan 500 cultural sites in order to transform them into digital 3D models. So far that has worked out quite well—at least for easily accessible examples such as the Brandenburg Gate in Germany or ancient Corinth in Greece. In crisis areas, failed states, and autocracies this task is a lot harder.

The CyArk organisation uses just about every tool that high-technology has to offer: 3D scanners, drones of every size, 360-degree cameras, 3D printers, smart software, and virtual reality systems. It seems as if the idea is certainly causing some serious stir: over 250 ambassadors, government officials, experts, and activists from 35 countries attended CyArk's annual conference in Berlin this year.

In countries such as Syria, Iraq, or Libya thousands are fighting against the ongoing destruction of historical sites. They are working against time, against the environment, against natural catastrophes, and most of all against war. Since ISIS (ISIL, Daesh) started its mass destruction of historical and religious sites, the threat has become bigger. Not a week goes by without a new YouTube video popping up that shows monuments being blown into bits and pieces or destroyed by hammer-swinging terrorists.

Davison and his students are supposed to respond to ISIS with a secret offensive—and they've got the support of industrial and political elites.

At the CyArk conference this past October, Francesco Bandarin has clearly put a lot of effort into his presentation about the ongoing destruction of historical sites. The former head of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre is projecting it on the wall: one picture after the other in a seemingly never-ending series. The Desolation of Jerusalem's temple 79BC. The demolition of Cluny Abbey by French revolutionaries. The total destruction of cities like Coventry or Dresden during World War II. "This all started way before ISIS," he says. Nowadays there are more conflicts on Earth than ever before—therefore the destruction of culture has reached a new dimension. "Wars are blind," says Bandarin.

While speaking to experts and activists, one thing becomes clear: what has been done, and is being done right now to preserve these cultural sites, is not enough. Besides the destruction of places of cultural interest by airstrikes or ground combats, there is the looting. It is the number one cause of deterioration. There are no confirmed numbers; the black market, where artefacts are bought and sold, is just as obscure as the illegal weapons or drugs trade. There is, however, a common consensus, that ISIS is bargaining with looted goods. For the Islamist militias it is the most important income after oil.

Bandarin says that there's a global reporting system in cooperation with Interpol and the UNESCO Convention regarding the protection of heritage sites published decades ago, but neither measure has so far managed to solve the problem. "90 percent of the artefacts are not from registered sites," Bandarin explains. And after it has looted them, ISIS destroys the source to cover its tracks. The culture is lost.

"Without the Arabian lute there would be no rock and roll."

If the digital Monuments Men had their way, there would be no covering of tracks. The activists are armed with notebooks, cameras, and smartphones. They are documenting everything that is still there. Merely the possession of those tools could cost them their lives.

"Through the destruction of those sites, ISIS also wants to eliminate memories," says Stefan Weber from the Museum of Islamic Art in Berlin. Anybody who wants to save those memories is an enemy in the eyes of the terror group and will be punished as such. "If we succeed in saving old knowledge, for example with the help of 3D scanners, then we can counteract this growing amnesia," explains Weber. "And memories are more than important, because without the Arabian lute there would be no rock and roll."

This is why CyArk announced a new project at its conference in October. It is also the mission that is sending Davison around the world. "Project Anqa" is a reaction to the destruction of the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra and the Mosul Museum in spring 2015. "This requires an immediate response," says Gustavo Araoz, a board member at CyArk.

No one has a better technological understanding of how to deal with this matter than Davison. He studied underwater archaeology because he loves diving. It didn’t take long before he became fascinated by the art of echo-sounding and reflection seismology. The first time he actually used it was in the Red Sea (pictured right). "You can make 2D and 3D shots of the deepest terrain with this technology," he explains. To leave the water and apply the technology on the shore was an easy one. And the potential is huge.

"Five years ago we had to use diesel engines to keep the instruments running. A scanner could maybe do eight scans a day with ten million pixels." Today the batteries fit in one hand and the machines scan ten billion pixels—per second. Newer techniques use algorithms that can even digitally restore destroyed ruins. The software also records alterations, for example the transformation of a mosque into a church and vice versa.

"The Technology is still pretty expensive, that is why we also show other possibilities to the activists in the field," says Davison. Just the journey alone to these heritage sites can be expensive or problematic.