The art of disguise

The criminal mastermind in his lair, richly furnished with old masters and museum-grade artefacts – stolen or bought with illicit funds, is a character long familiar from novel and film, while wholesale theft of antiquities from conflict zones is all too real [1]: both make it hard to understand why anti-money laundering regulation is only now properly catching up with the trade in art and antiquities. Michael Kosmides asks how dealers and collectors will respond.