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Entering the planet's most popular art institution in the middle of the day, grabbing eight items of invaluable Napoleonic jewellery and disappearing into Paris traffic on simple scooters may seem like the most audacious of crimes, executed for global fame and ensuing Hollywood film treatments.

Specialists 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 quick-hit thefts centered more on the monetary worth of precious stones or metals than the artifacts’ significance, perpetuating a trend that has appeared 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 thieves who want to take expensive jewellery are entering a globally renowned museum rather than a Cartier store,” said an expert in art recovery. “It's straightforward: it’s because these days a high-end boutique is more secure.”

A spate of aggressive jewellery shop thefts mean that many stores have strengthened their protection in recent years, with armed guards on their premises and merchandise no longer shown overnight. Cultural institutions, on the other hand, look vulnerable, in part because of the inherent factor of being public-facing institutions in historic buildings, and also the financial situation in many developed nations.

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

The robbery of the items – featuring necklaces made up of eight sapphires and hundreds of gems, the crown of Empress Eugénie featuring nearly 2,000 diamonds and a extremely expensive diadem once owned by Napoleon III’s wife that the thieves dropped by the roadside on their way out – has inevitably drawn comparisons with the 1911 theft of the Mona Lisa from the same museum, carried out by the worker the thief.

Better points of reference may be the recent theft of valuables from a German institution worth over millions, the theft of a multi-million pound gold toilet from a UK landmark the that year, the recent robbery of a large gold coin from Berlin’s Bode Museum or even a spate of thefts of sports memorabilia from US mining museums.

“There’s a simple pattern here,” explained Marinello. “Smash, grab, and melt it down as rapidly as possible.”

If the items were to stay whole, experts say, the thieves 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”, commented an art crime researcher of the a relevant organization.

“They would be immediately recognised, especially given the Ministry of Culture has released images of the items. Even a individual buyer or an sales venue would want to see documentation confirming proper ownership before touching such striking pieces.”

In the previous years, institutions were often hesitant to go public about the disappearance of famous works of art and would remain quiet out of shame. Now, as art thefts are more reported on, the storage and sale of taken items is risky business for any lawbreaker.

“Taking a Picasso, it has to stay complete or it becomes worthless, and you have to devise a scheme to keep it in hiding, perhaps by passing it around dangerous individuals,” noted Marinello. “There's ongoing risk to the risk of an partner informing authorities to collect a ransom.”

For similar reasons, an art detective said it was vanishingly unlikely that the theft had been commissioned. “Stolen to order is something from films,” he said. “No one would handle these items. It's global news and in all the media. If you buy this, if you are apprehended, you end up in prison. You can't display it to your friends, you cannot bequeath it to your family.”

Altering stolen works by melting down or re-cutting does lower the value. When it comes to gems, it also comes with considerable risk because modern methods give stones a larger and brighter surface area, and older-style stones would either draw unwanted attention or barter the price down for a concealment.

Crucially, however, melting down or re-cutting eliminates the proof of the crime. “My guess is that the Louvre thieves will try to take the stolen goods to locations with diamond expertise like Israel, India or even as nearby as a city, and find someone to remove the stones,” 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 criticising “considerable” and “ongoing” slow progress in modernizing systems and observing that surveillance were lacking in many rooms. But specialists say displaying valuable objects in historic buildings with a constant flow of guests comes with dangers that are not possible to remove entirely.

“Historic buildings are much harder to secure,” said an art crime professor. “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 proper bulletproof glass.”

The most solid security systems for structures should be designed “like a fortress”, noted a security advisor. “There should be several layers to repel attackers.”

Contemporary structures are equipped with state-of-the-art external CCTV cameras or integrated vibration sensors that alert about a smashed window in immediately, but old museums may be hesitant to uglify their exteriors. Laser scanners can be difficult to fit to decorated surfaces. Motion and sound detectors may also have to be turned off during the day as hordes of visitors walk through a museum.

The timing of the Louvre raid, which took place between morning hours in Paris, was typical of recent thefts, Stürmann said. “It's logical why robberies tend to happen at either opening or closing times. Frequently when security rotate and prior to the museum is crowded who effectively act as additional security staff.”

Advances in technology may have introduced new devices that can raise the alarm more quickly and effectively, but it has also given thieves new tools with which to circumvent security measures. In Paris, the robbers accessed the museum’s upper level with a mobile equipment and breached a glass pane with a battery-powered disc cutter.

An author said the discussion in the country about the 232-year-old building had mostly focused on crowd control in the past decade, and less on protection.

The institution has an on-site brigade of about fifty permanent firefighters, but their purpose is mainly to protect the artworks from blazes and flooding. “There is no quick reaction team,” Sciolino said. “Ultimately, the security of the Louvre all depends on political will and funding, and currently France lacks sufficient resources.”