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Breaking into the planet's most popular art institution in the middle of the day, grabbing eight items of invaluable Napoleonic jewellery and vanishing into Paris traffic on humble scooters may seem like the boldest of crimes, executed for international notoriety and subsequent movie adaptations.

Experts who study trends in international art crime, however, see the recent robbery at the Louvre as a more practical matter: the most recent in a series of smash-and-grab thefts centered more on the monetary worth of valuable gems or materials than the historical importance, perpetuating a pattern that has emerged over the last decade in Europe, Britain and the US. The location, they suggest, would have been of secondary concern to the thieves.

“One might wonder why criminals who want to take valuable jewellery are breaking into a globally renowned museum rather than a luxury jewelry store,” stated an expert in art recovery. “The answer is simple: it’s because nowadays a Cartier store is more secure.”

A spate of violent jewellery shop thefts mean that many outlets have strengthened their protection in the past few years, with armed guards on their premises and merchandise no longer kept on display overnight. Museums, meanwhile, look more exposed, in part because of the in-built reason of being accessible institutions in older structures, and partly the current economic climate in many developed nations.

“After the pandemic, governments across the world have reduced spending on police and the arts funding,” 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 hundreds of gems, the tiara of a historical figure containing thousands of diamonds and a extremely expensive diadem once possessed by a royal that the robbers left by the roadside on their way out – has inevitably been compared with the 1911 theft of the famous painting from the same museum, carried out by the worker Vincenzo Peruggia.

Better comparisons may be the 2019 burglary of jewellery from Dresden’s Green Vault Museum worth over €113m, the theft of a multi-million pound valuable object from Blenheim Palace the that year, the 2017 robbery of a valuable item from Berlin’s Bode Museum or even a spate of robberies of sports memorabilia from US mining museums.

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

If the artefacts were to remain intact, experts say, the criminals would struggle to sell them. “It's impossible to sell something as recognizable as the museum's gems on the licit market”, commented an art crime researcher of the a relevant organization.

“They would be immediately recognised, especially given the cultural authorities has released images of the items. Even a individual buyer or an auction house would want to see paperwork establishing legal possession before handling such striking pieces.”

In the previous years, institutions were often hesitant to announce publicly about the loss of famous art pieces and would remain quiet out of embarrassment. These days, as cultural robberies are more reported on, the keeping and sale of stolen art is dangerous for any lawbreaker.

“If you steal a Picasso, it has to stay complete or it becomes valueless, and you have to conceive of a scheme to conceal it, maybe by passing it around dangerous individuals,” said Marinello. “There's ongoing risk to the danger of an partner telling the police to collect a ransom.”

For similar reasons, an investigator said it was vanishingly unlikely that the theft had been ordered. “Commissioned theft is something from Hollywood movies,” he said. “No one would handle these items. It's global news and in all the newspapers. If you buy this, if you are apprehended, you go to jail. You can't display it to your friends, you cannot bequeath it to your children.”

Modifying stolen works by dismantling or reshaping does reduce the value. When it comes to diamonds, it also comes with considerable risk because contemporary methods give stones a larger and brighter appearance, and antique-cut stones would either draw unwanted attention or reduce value for a concealment.

Crucially, however, dismantling or reshaping removes the proof of the theft. “I suspect that the Louvre thieves will try to bring the items to locations with gem knowledge like Israel, another nation or even as close as Antwerp, and locate an expert to remove the gems,” said Marinello.

The robbery at the Louvre has already brought up concerns about security measures at the institution, with a leaked state auditor report expected to be released next month pointing out “considerable” and “ongoing” delays in modernizing equipment and noting that surveillance were lacking in many rooms. But security experts say showing valuable objects in older structures with a steady stream of guests comes with dangers that are impossible to remove entirely.

“Older structures are more difficult to secure,” explained an art crime professor. “They often have large accessible windows that allows for thieves to escape, and there may be preservation laws in place that mean you can’t fit them with secure windows.”

The most solid protective measures for structures should be designed “as a stronghold”, said a security advisor. “It should include several layers to repel intruders.”

Contemporary structures are equipped with state-of-the-art surveillance systems or integrated seismic detectors that raise alarm about a broken glass in real time, but historic institutions may be hesitant to uglify their exteriors. Detection devices can be difficult to fit to decorated surfaces. Sensors may also have to be turned off during the daytime as crowds stomp through a museum.

The schedule of the robbery, which occurred between 9.30am and 9.40am local time, was common of modern robberies, Stürmann said. “There’s a good reason why thefts tend to happen at either opening or closing times. It’s often when guards rotate and before the museum is full of visitors who actually act as additional security staff.”

Advances in technology 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 protections. In the city, the robbers accessed the museum’s upper level with a mobile equipment and cut through a window with a battery-powered disc cutter.

Elaine Sciolino said the discussion in the country about the historic building had mostly centered on crowd control in the past decade, and not as much on security.

The institution has an in-house team of about fifty permanent emergency personnel, but their purpose is mainly to protect the artworks from blazes and flooding. “There isn't a quick reaction team,” Sciolino said. “Ultimately, the security of the Louvre all comes down to political will and funding, and currently France simply has no resources.”