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Breaking into the world’s most-visited museum in broad daylight, grabbing eight pieces of priceless Napoleonic jewellery and disappearing into the city traffic on humble scooters may seem like the boldest of crimes, carried out for global fame and ensuing Hollywood film treatments.

Experts who observe trends in international art crime, however, see Sunday morning’s heist at the Louvre as a more practical matter: the latest in a string of quick-hit thefts focused more on the material value of valuable gems or metals than the artifacts’ significance, continuing a pattern that has appeared over the last ten years in Germany, the UK and the US. The venue, they propose, would have been of secondary concern to the criminals.

“You may ask why criminals who want to take expensive jewellery are entering a world-famous museum rather than a Cartier store,” said an expert in art recovery. “It's straightforward: it’s because these days a Cartier store is better protected.”

A spate of aggressive jewellery shop thefts mean that many outlets have beefed up their protection in the past few years, with security personnel on their premises and wares no longer shown overnight. Cultural institutions, on the other hand, look more exposed, in part because of the inherent reason of being accessible institutions in older structures, and also the current economic climate in many western countries.

“After the pandemic, governments across the globe have cut back on law enforcement and the culture sector,” noted Marinello. “If thieves can get into the Louvre, it shows how vulnerable our museums have become. This is a horrible time to be a museum.”

The robbery of the items – including jewelry pieces made up of precious stones and 631 diamonds, the tiara of Empress Eugénie containing nearly 2,000 diamonds and a hugely valuable diadem once owned by a royal that the thieves left by the roadside on their way out – has inevitably drawn comparisons with the historical theft of the famous painting from the same museum, carried out by the Italian handyman the thief.

More relevant comparisons may be the recent burglary of jewellery from Dresden’s Green Vault Museum worth over €113m, the theft of a multi-million pound valuable object from a UK landmark the that year, the recent robbery of a valuable item from a European museum or even a series of robberies of collector items from US mining museums.

“It's a clear trend here,” said Marinello. “Smash, grab, and melt it down as quickly as possible.”

If the artefacts were to stay whole, experts say, the criminals would find it hard to sell them. “There’s no way to trade something as recognizable as the museum's gems on the legal marketplace”, commented an art crime researcher of the Association for Research into Crimes against Art.

“They are too well-known, especially given the cultural authorities has published photos of the items. Even a private collector or an auction house would want to see paperwork establishing proper ownership before handling such striking pieces.”

In the previous years, museums were often reluctant to announce publicly about the loss of famous works of art and would remain quiet out of shame. Now, as art thefts are more reported on, the keeping and selling of stolen art is dangerous for any lawbreaker.

“Taking a Picasso, it has to stay complete or it becomes worthless, and you have to devise a plan to conceal it, perhaps by passing it around difficult criminal actors,” said Marinello. “And you’re constantly exposed to the risk of an accomplice informing authorities to collect a reward.”

For comparable factors, an investigator said it was highly improbable that the robbery had been commissioned. “Stolen to order is something from Hollywood movies,” he said. “No one would handle these items. It’s all around the world and in all the newspapers. If you acquire these, if you are apprehended, you go to jail. You cannot show it to your friends, you cannot bequeath it to your children.”

Altering stolen works by dismantling or reshaping does lower the worth. When it comes to gems, it also comes with considerable risk because modern cutting techniques give stones a larger and brighter appearance, and older-style stones would either attract notice or reduce value for a concealment.

Importantly, however, melting down or re-cutting eliminates the proof of the theft. “My guess is that the Louvre thieves will try to take the stolen goods to places with diamond expertise like Israel, another nation or even as nearby as Antwerp, and locate an expert to remove the stones,” suggested Marinello.

The robbery at the Louvre has already raised questions about security measures at the institution, with a leaked state auditor report expected to be released soon criticising “considerable” and “persistent” slow progress in modernizing systems and noting that surveillance were missing in many rooms. But specialists say showing valuable objects in older structures with a steady stream of visitors comes with dangers that are impossible to remove entirely.

“Historic buildings are more difficult to protect,” said Erin Thompson. “Many of them have nice big street-facing windows that allows for criminals to escape, and there may be building protection statutes in place that mean you are unable to install them with secure windows.”

The best protective measures for buildings should be conceptualised “as a stronghold”, said Peter Stürmann. “It should include multiple levels to deter intruders.”

Contemporary structures are fitted with state-of-the-art external CCTV cameras or in-built seismic detectors that alert about a smashed window in immediately, but old museums may be reluctant to alter their exteriors. Detection devices can be hard to install to stuccoed ceilings. Motion and sound detectors may also have to be disabled during the daytime as crowds walk through a museum.

The schedule of the Louvre raid, which occurred between 9.30am and 9.40am in Paris, was typical of modern robberies, Stürmann said. “There’s a good reason why robberies tend to happen at either start or end of day. It’s often when guards change their shifts and before the museum is crowded who effectively act as extra protection.”

Technological progress may have thrown up new devices that can notify more quickly and effectively, but it has also given robbers new tools with which to bypass security measures. In Paris, the thieves accessed the museum’s upper level with a vehicle-mounted ladder and cut through a window with a battery-powered disc cutter.

Elaine Sciolino said the conversation in the country about the historic building had mostly focused on crowd control in recent years, and less on security.

The institution has an on-site team of about fifty full-time emergency personnel, but their mission is mainly to protect the artworks from fires and flooding. “There isn't a rapid-response unit,” Sciolino said. “Ultimately, the security of the Louvre all depends on government support and funding, and at present the nation lacks sufficient money.”