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Entering the world’s most-visited art institution in broad daylight, taking eight pieces of priceless Napoleonic jewellery and disappearing into Paris traffic on humble scooters may seem like the boldest of crimes, carried out for global fame and subsequent Hollywood film treatments.

Experts who study patterns in international art crime, however, see the recent heist at the Louvre as something more prosaic: 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 trend that has emerged over the last decade in Europe, Britain and the US. The venue, they propose, would have been of lesser importance to the thieves.

“One might wonder why thieves who want to steal expensive jewellery are entering a world-famous museum rather than a luxury jewelry store,” stated Christopher A Marinello. “It's straightforward: it’s because nowadays a high-end boutique is better protected.”

A series of violent jewellery shop thefts indicate that many stores have strengthened their protection in recent years, with armed guards on their locations and merchandise no longer shown overnight. Museums, on the other hand, look vulnerable, in part because of the in-built reason of being public-facing institutions in historic buildings, and partly the financial situation in many developed nations.

“After the pandemic, governments across the globe have cut back on police and the culture sector,” noted Marinello. “With criminals entering the Louvre, it demonstrates how vulnerable our museums have become. This is a difficult time to be a museum.”

The robbery of the objects – including necklaces made up of precious stones and hundreds of gems, the crown of a historical figure featuring nearly 2,000 diamonds and a hugely valuable crown once possessed by a royal that the thieves dropped by the street on their way out – has naturally been compared with the historical theft of the famous painting from the same museum, carried out by the worker Vincenzo Peruggia.

More relevant points of reference may be the 2019 burglary of valuables from Dresden’s Green Vault Museum worth over €113m, the taking of a multi-million pound valuable object from a UK landmark the that year, the recent robbery of a valuable item from Berlin’s Bode Museum or even a spate of thefts of collector items from US mining museums.

“It's a clear trend here,” explained Marinello. “Break in, take items, and dismantle them as quickly as possible.”

If the artefacts were to stay whole, experts say, the criminals would find it hard to find a buyer. “There’s no way to sell something as immediately identifiable as the museum's gems on the legal marketplace”, said Lynda Albertson of the a relevant organization.

“They are too well-known, especially given the Ministry of Culture has released images of the pieces. Even a individual buyer or an auction house would want to see paperwork confirming proper ownership before handling such striking pieces.”

In the previous years, museums were often reluctant to go public about the disappearance of well-known art pieces 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 valueless, and you have to devise a plan to conceal it, perhaps by passing it around dangerous individuals,” noted Marinello. “And you’re constantly exposed to the risk of an accomplice informing authorities to cash in a ransom.”

For comparable factors, an art detective said it was vanishingly unlikely that the robbery had been ordered. “Stolen to order is something from films,” he said. “Nobody would touch this. It’s all around the world and in all the media. If you acquire these, if you are apprehended, you go to jail. You can't display it to your acquaintances, you cannot bequeath it to your family.”

Modifying taken items by melting down or reshaping does lower the worth. When it comes to diamonds, it also comes with significant danger because contemporary methods give gems a bigger and lighter surface area, and older-style stones would either draw unwanted attention or reduce value for a concealment.

Crucially, however, dismantling or re-cutting removes the proof of the crime. “I suspect that the robbers will try to take the items to places with diamond expertise like Israel, another nation or even as nearby as a city, and locate an expert to remove the stones,” said Marinello.

The robbery at the Louvre has already raised questions about protective steps at the institution, with a unauthorized state auditor report expected to be published soon pointing out “significant” and “ongoing” slow progress in modernizing systems and noting that surveillance were lacking in multiple areas. But security experts say showing precious items in historic buildings with a steady stream of guests comes with risks that are not possible to eliminate completely.

“Historic buildings are more difficult to secure,” explained an art crime professor. “They often have nice big street-facing windows that allows for thieves to get away, and there may be preservation laws in place that mean you can’t fit them with secure windows.”

The most solid security systems for structures should be conceptualised “as a stronghold”, said Peter Stürmann. “It should include 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 smashed window in real time, but old museums may be hesitant to alter their appearance. Detection devices can be difficult to fit to stuccoed ceilings. Motion and sound detectors may also have to be turned off during the day as crowds stomp through a museum.

The schedule of the Louvre raid, which occurred between morning hours in Paris, was typical of recent thefts, Stürmann said. “There’s a good reason why thefts tend to happen at either start or end of day. Frequently when security rotate and before the museum is full of visitors who effectively act as extra protection.”

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 security measures. In Paris, the thieves accessed the museum’s first-floor window with a mobile equipment and breached a glass pane with a electric tool.

Elaine Sciolino said the discussion in France about the historic building had primarily focused on crowd control in recent years, and not as much on protection.

The museum has an on-site team of about fifty permanent emergency personnel, but their mission is mainly to safeguard the artworks from blazes and water damage. “There is no rapid-response unit,” Sciolino said. “In the end, the safety of the Louvre all depends on political will and funding, and at present France lacks sufficient money.”