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Entering the planet's most popular museum in broad daylight, grabbing eight pieces of priceless Napoleonic jewellery and vanishing into Paris traffic on simple scooters may seem like the boldest of crimes, carried out for global fame and ensuing movie adaptations.

Specialists who observe patterns in global cultural theft, however, see the recent robbery at the Louvre as a more practical matter: the most recent in a string of smash-and-grab thefts focused more on the monetary worth of valuable gems or metals than the artifacts’ significance, perpetuating a pattern that has appeared over the last ten years in Germany, Britain and the US. The location, they suggest, would have been of secondary concern to the thieves.

“One might wonder why thieves who want to steal valuable jewellery are breaking into a globally renowned museum rather than a Cartier store,” stated an expert in art recovery. “It's straightforward: it’s because nowadays a Cartier store is more secure.”

A series of violent jewellery shop thefts indicate that many outlets have strengthened their security in recent years, with security personnel on their premises and merchandise no longer shown overnight. Museums, on the other hand, look vulnerable, in part because of the in-built factor of being accessible institutions in historic buildings, and also the current economic climate in many western countries.

“After the pandemic, authorities across the world have cut back on police and the culture sector,” said Marinello. “With criminals entering the Louvre, it shows how at risk our museums have become. This is a difficult time to be a museum.”

The robbery of the items – including jewelry pieces made up of precious stones and 631 diamonds, the crown of Empress Eugénie featuring thousands of diamonds and a hugely valuable diadem once possessed by Napoleon III’s wife that the robbers dropped by the roadside on their way out – has naturally been compared with the historical theft of the famous painting from the same museum, performed by the worker Vincenzo Peruggia.

More relevant comparisons may be the recent burglary of jewellery from a German institution worth over €113m, the theft of a £4.75m valuable object from a UK landmark the that year, the 2017 heist of a large gold coin from Berlin’s Bode Museum or even a spate of thefts of sports memorabilia from American institutions.

“There’s a simple pattern here,” explained 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 sell them. “There’s no way to trade something as immediately identifiable as the museum's gems on the legal marketplace”, said Lynda Albertson of the a relevant organization.

“They would be immediately recognised, especially given the cultural authorities has released images of the pieces. Even a private collector or an sales venue would want to see documentation establishing legal possession before handling such remarkable pieces.”

In the previous years, institutions were often reluctant to go public about the loss of well-known 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 famous painting, it has to remain intact or it becomes valueless, and you have to devise a plan to keep it in hiding, perhaps by passing it around difficult criminal actors,” said Marinello. “There's ongoing risk to the danger of an partner telling the police to collect a reward.”

For comparable factors, an art detective said it was vanishingly unlikely that the theft 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 get caught, you go to jail. You can't display it to your acquaintances, you cannot leave it to your children.”

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

Importantly, however, dismantling or reshaping eliminates the proof of the theft. “I suspect that the Louvre thieves will try to bring the stolen goods to places with diamond expertise like Israel, India or even as close as a city, and find someone to cut out the gems,” suggested Marinello.

The robbery at the Louvre has already raised questions about security measures at the museum, with a unauthorized official review expected to be released next month pointing out “considerable” and “persistent” delays in updating systems and noting that surveillance were missing in many rooms. But security experts say displaying valuable objects in older structures with a constant flow of guests comes with risks that are impossible to remove entirely.

“Older structures are more difficult to secure,” said Erin Thompson. “Many of them have large accessible windows that allows for criminals to escape, and there may be building protection statutes in place that mean you can’t fit them with secure windows.”

The best security systems for buildings should be conceptualised “like a fortress”, said a security advisor. “There should be several layers to deter intruders.”

Contemporary structures are fitted with advanced external CCTV cameras or in-built vibration sensors that raise alarm about a smashed window in immediately, but historic institutions may be hesitant to uglify their appearance. Laser scanners can be hard to install to decorated surfaces. Motion and sound detectors may also have to be disabled during the daytime as crowds walk through a museum.

The timing of the robbery, which occurred between morning hours 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. Frequently when guards change their shifts and before the museum is crowded who effectively act as extra protection.”

Technological progress may have introduced new gadgets that can notify more quickly and efficiently, but it has also provided robbers new methods with which to circumvent protections. In the city, the robbers accessed the museum’s first-floor window with a vehicle-mounted ladder and cut through a window with a electric tool.

An author said the conversation in the country about the historic structure had primarily focused on crowd control in recent years, and not as much on security.

The museum has an in-house brigade of about 50 permanent emergency personnel, but their mission is mainly to safeguard the collection from blazes and water damage. “There isn't a rapid-response unit,” Sciolino said. “In the end, the safety of the Louvre all comes down to government support and funding, and currently France lacks sufficient resources.”