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Entering the world’s most-visited museum in broad daylight, grabbing eight pieces of priceless Napoleonic jewellery and disappearing into Paris traffic on simple scooters may seem like the boldest of crimes, executed for international notoriety and ensuing Hollywood film treatments.

Experts who observe patterns in global cultural theft, however, see the recent robbery at the Louvre as a more practical matter: the latest in a string of quick-hit thefts focused more on the monetary worth of valuable gems or materials than the artifacts’ significance, perpetuating a trend that has emerged over the last decade in Europe, Britain and the US. The location, they suggest, would have been of lesser importance to the thieves.

“One might wonder why criminals who want to steal valuable jewellery are breaking into a globally renowned museum rather than a Cartier store,” said Christopher A Marinello. “The answer is simple: it’s because nowadays a Cartier store is more secure.”

A series of violent jewellery shop thefts mean that many outlets have strengthened their protection in recent years, with security personnel on their locations and merchandise no longer shown overnight. Museums, meanwhile, look vulnerable, partly because of the in-built factor of being public-facing institutions in historic buildings, and also the current economic climate in many western countries.

“Since Covid, authorities across the globe have reduced spending on law enforcement and the culture sector,” noted Marinello. “With criminals entering the Louvre, it demonstrates how at risk our museums have become. This is a difficult time to be a museum.”

The theft of the objects – including jewelry pieces made up of eight sapphires and 631 diamonds, the tiara of a historical figure featuring nearly 2,000 diamonds and a hugely valuable diadem once owned by a royal that the robbers dropped by the street on their way out – has naturally been compared with the 1911 theft of the famous painting from the same museum, carried out by the worker Vincenzo Peruggia.

More relevant points of reference may be the recent theft of valuables from Dresden’s Green Vault Museum worth over €113m, the taking of a multi-million pound gold toilet from a UK landmark the same year, the 2017 robbery of a valuable item from Berlin’s Bode Museum or even a spate of robberies of collector items from American institutions.

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

If the artefacts were to remain intact, experts say, the thieves would find it hard to sell them. “There’s no way to trade something as immediately identifiable as the Louvre’s jewels on the legal marketplace”, commented an art crime researcher of the a relevant organization.

“They would be immediately recognised, particularly given the Ministry of Culture has released images of the items. Even a private collector or an auction house would want to see documentation establishing proper ownership before touching such remarkable pieces.”

In the previous years, institutions were often hesitant to announce publicly about the loss of famous works of art and would remain quiet out of shame. These days, as cultural robberies are more widely publicised, the storage and sale of stolen art is risky business for any criminal.

“If you steal a famous painting, it has to remain intact or it becomes worthless, and you have to conceive of a scheme to conceal it, maybe by moving it among difficult criminal actors,” said Marinello. “And you’re constantly exposed to the risk of an accomplice telling the police to collect a reward.”

For similar reasons, an art detective said it was highly improbable that the robbery had been ordered. “Commissioned theft is something from films,” he said. “No one would handle these items. It's global news and in all the media. If you acquire these, if you get caught, you go to jail. You can't display it to your acquaintances, you cannot bequeath it to your family.”

Altering stolen works by dismantling or reshaping does reduce the value. When it comes to diamonds, it also comes with significant danger because contemporary methods give gems a larger and lighter surface area, and antique-cut stones would either draw unwanted attention or barter the price down for a concealment.

Crucially, however, melting down or reshaping removes the evidence of the crime. “I suspect that the robbers will try to bring the items to locations with diamond expertise like a country, another nation or even as close as Antwerp, and locate an expert to cut out the stones,” said Marinello.

The robbery at the Louvre has already brought up concerns about protective steps at the museum, with a leaked state auditor report expected to be published next month pointing out “considerable” and “ongoing” delays in updating equipment and observing that surveillance were missing in multiple areas. But security experts say showing precious items in historic buildings with a constant flow of visitors comes with dangers that are not possible to remove entirely.

“Older structures are much harder to protect,” said an art crime professor. “They often have large accessible 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 proper bulletproof glass.”

The most solid protective measures for buildings should be designed “as a stronghold”, noted a security advisor. “There should be multiple levels to deter attackers.”

Contemporary structures are equipped with state-of-the-art external CCTV cameras or integrated vibration sensors that raise alarm about a broken glass in immediately, but historic institutions may be hesitant to uglify their appearance. Laser scanners can be difficult to install to stuccoed ceilings. Motion and sound detectors may also have to be turned off during the daytime as hordes of visitors stomp through a museum.

The timing of the robbery, which took place between morning hours 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. Frequently when guards change their shifts and prior to the museum is full of visitors who effectively act as additional security staff.”

Technological progress may have introduced new devices that can raise the alarm more quickly and efficiently, but it has also provided thieves new tools with which to circumvent security measures. In the city, the robbers accessed the museum’s upper level with a mobile equipment and breached a window with a electric tool.

An author said the conversation in France about the historic structure had primarily focused on visitor management in the past decade, and less on security.

The museum has an in-house brigade of about 50 full-time firefighters, but their purpose is mostly to protect the artworks from fires and water damage. “There is no quick reaction team,” Sciolino said. “Ultimately, the security of the Louvre all comes down to government support and funding, and currently the nation simply has no resources.”