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Entering the planet's most popular museum in broad daylight, taking eight pieces of priceless Napoleonic jewellery and disappearing into the city traffic on simple scooters may seem like the most audacious of crimes, executed for global fame and ensuing Hollywood film treatments.

Specialists who observe trends in global cultural theft, however, see the recent heist at the Louvre as something more prosaic: the most recent in a series of quick-hit thefts focused more on the material value of precious stones or materials than the artifacts’ significance, perpetuating a pattern that has appeared over the last ten years in Europe, Britain and the US. The venue, they suggest, would have been of lesser importance to the criminals.

“You may ask why criminals who want to steal expensive jewellery are breaking into a globally renowned museum rather than a luxury jewelry store,” said Christopher A Marinello. “The answer is simple: it’s because nowadays a Cartier store is more secure.”

A series of aggressive jewellery shop thefts mean that many outlets have beefed up their security in recent years, with armed guards on their premises and merchandise no longer shown overnight. Museums, meanwhile, look vulnerable, in part because of the in-built reason of being accessible institutions in historic buildings, and also the financial situation in many western countries.

“Since Covid, authorities across the globe have cut back on law enforcement and the culture sector,” noted Marinello. “With criminals entering the Louvre, it demonstrates how vulnerable our institutions have become. This is a horrible time to be a museum.”

The theft of the objects – featuring necklaces made up of eight sapphires and 631 diamonds, the crown of Empress Eugénie containing thousands of diamonds and a extremely expensive diadem once owned by Napoleon III’s wife that the robbers dropped by the street on their way out – has naturally drawn comparisons with the 1911 theft of the Mona Lisa from the Louvre, performed by the Italian handyman the thief.

Better points of reference may be the recent burglary of jewellery from a German institution worth over €113m, the taking of a £4.75m valuable object from Blenheim Palace the same year, the 2017 heist of a large gold coin from a European museum or even a series of robberies of sports memorabilia from US mining museums.

“There’s a simple pattern here,” said Marinello. “Break in, take items, and dismantle them as quickly as possible.”

If the items were to stay whole, specialists say, the criminals would struggle to find a buyer. “There’s no way to trade something as immediately identifiable as the museum's gems on the licit market”, said an art crime researcher of the Association for Research into Crimes against Art.

“They are too well-known, particularly given the cultural authorities has published photos of the pieces. Even a individual buyer or an sales venue would want to see paperwork confirming proper ownership before handling such striking pieces.”

In the past, museums were often reluctant to go public about the loss of well-known works of art and would remain quiet out of embarrassment. These days, as art thefts are more widely publicised, the keeping and sale of taken items is risky business for any criminal.

“If you steal a Picasso, it has to stay complete or it becomes valueless, and you have to conceive of a plan to keep it in hiding, maybe by passing it around difficult criminal actors,” noted Marinello. “There's ongoing risk to the danger of an accomplice telling the police to collect a ransom.”

For comparable factors, an investigator said it was vanishingly unlikely that the robbery had been ordered. “Commissioned theft is something from films,” he said. “Nobody would touch this. It’s all around the world and in all the media. If you buy this, if you are apprehended, you go to jail. You can't display it to your acquaintances, you cannot leave it to your children.”

Altering taken items by melting down or reshaping does lower the value. When it comes to diamonds, it also comes with considerable risk because contemporary cutting techniques give stones a bigger and lighter appearance, and antique-cut stones would either attract notice or reduce value for a concealment.

Importantly, however, melting down or reshaping removes the proof of the crime. “I suspect that the robbers will try to bring the stolen goods to places with gem knowledge like a country, India or even as nearby as Antwerp, and locate an expert to cut out the gems,” said Marinello.

The heist at the Louvre has already raised questions about protective steps at the museum, with a unauthorized state auditor report expected to be released soon pointing out “significant” and “persistent” slow progress in updating systems and noting that security cameras were missing in many rooms. But specialists say showing valuable objects in historic buildings with a constant flow of visitors comes with dangers that are impossible to eliminate completely.

“Historic buildings are more difficult to secure,” explained an art crime professor. “They often have large accessible windows that makes it easy for criminals to get away, and there may be preservation laws in place that mean you can’t fit them with secure windows.”

The best security systems for structures should be conceptualised “as a stronghold”, said a security advisor. “It should include several layers to deter attackers.”

Modern buildings are fitted with advanced external CCTV cameras or in-built vibration sensors that raise alarm about a broken glass in real time, but historic institutions 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 turned off during the day as crowds stomp through a museum.

The schedule of the robbery, which took place 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 opening or closing times. It’s often when security change their shifts and prior to the museum is full of visitors who actually act as extra protection.”

Technological progress may have introduced new gadgets that can raise the alarm more quickly and efficiently, but it has also given robbers new methods with which to circumvent protections. In Paris, the robbers accessed the museum’s first-floor window with a mobile equipment and cut through a glass pane with a electric tool.

An author said the discussion in France about the 232-year-old structure had mostly centered on crowd control in recent years, and less on security.

The museum has an on-site team of about fifty full-time emergency personnel, but their purpose is mostly to protect the collection from fires and flooding. “There isn't a quick reaction team,” Sciolino said. “Ultimately, the safety of the Louvre all depends on government support and funding, and at present France simply has no resources.”