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Entering the world’s most-visited art institution in broad daylight, grabbing eight items of invaluable historical gems and vanishing into Paris traffic on simple scooters may seem like the most audacious of crimes, executed for international notoriety and subsequent Hollywood film treatments.

Experts who study trends in global cultural theft, however, see the recent robbery at the Louvre as a more practical matter: the most recent in a string of quick-hit thefts focused more on the monetary worth of precious stones or metals than the artifacts’ significance, perpetuating a pattern that has emerged over the last decade in Germany, Britain and the US. The venue, they suggest, would have been of lesser importance to the criminals.

“One might wonder why thieves who want to take expensive jewellery are entering a globally renowned museum rather than a Cartier store,” stated Christopher A Marinello. “The answer is simple: it’s because nowadays a Cartier store is better protected.”

A spate of aggressive retail store thefts indicate that many outlets have beefed up their protection in the past few years, with armed guards on their locations and wares no longer shown overnight. Museums, on the other hand, look more exposed, in part because of the in-built reason of being public-facing institutions in historic buildings, and also the current economic climate in many developed nations.

“Since Covid, governments across the globe have reduced spending on law enforcement and the arts funding,” said Marinello. “With criminals entering the Louvre, it demonstrates how vulnerable our institutions have become. This is a horrible time to be a museum.”

The robbery of the objects – featuring necklaces made up of eight sapphires and hundreds of gems, the crown of Empress Eugénie containing thousands of diamonds and a extremely expensive diadem once owned by a royal that the robbers dropped by the roadside on their way out – has inevitably drawn comparisons with the 1911 theft of the famous painting from the Louvre, carried out by the Italian handyman Vincenzo Peruggia.

More relevant points of reference may be the 2019 theft of jewellery from Dresden’s Green Vault Museum worth over €113m, the theft of a £4.75m valuable object from Blenheim Palace the that year, the 2017 heist of a valuable item from a European museum or even a spate of thefts of sports memorabilia from American institutions.

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

If the artefacts were to remain intact, experts say, the criminals would struggle to find a buyer. “It's impossible to sell something as immediately identifiable as the museum's gems on the licit market”, 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 sales venue would want to see paperwork establishing proper ownership before touching such remarkable pieces.”

In the previous years, institutions were often hesitant to announce publicly about the loss of well-known art pieces and would stay silent out of shame. Now, as cultural robberies are more widely publicised, the storage and selling of taken items is dangerous for any criminal.

“Taking a Picasso, it has to remain intact or it becomes worthless, and you have to devise a scheme to keep it in hiding, maybe by moving it among difficult criminal actors,” said Marinello. “And you’re constantly exposed to the danger of an accomplice informing authorities to collect a reward.”

For similar reasons, an art detective said it was highly improbable 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 newspapers. If you acquire these, if you get caught, you go to jail. You cannot show it to your acquaintances, you cannot leave it to your children.”

Modifying taken items by dismantling or reshaping does lower the worth. When it comes to diamonds, it also comes with considerable risk because modern cutting techniques give stones a bigger and brighter surface area, and antique-cut stones would either draw unwanted attention or reduce value for a concealment.

Importantly, however, dismantling or reshaping removes the proof of the crime. “My guess is that the Louvre thieves will try to bring the stolen goods to places with diamond expertise like Israel, another nation or even as close as Antwerp, and locate an expert to cut out the stones,” suggested Marinello.

The heist at the Louvre has already raised questions about security measures at the institution, with a leaked official review expected to be published next month pointing out “significant” and “ongoing” slow progress in updating equipment and observing that security cameras were missing in many rooms. But security experts say displaying precious items in historic buildings with a constant flow of guests comes with risks that are not possible to remove entirely.

“Older structures are more difficult to protect,” said an art crime professor. “Many of them have large accessible windows that makes it easy for thieves 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 designed “as a stronghold”, noted Peter Stürmann. “There should be multiple levels to deter intruders.”

Contemporary structures are fitted with advanced surveillance systems or in-built seismic detectors that alert about a broken glass in immediately, but historic institutions may be hesitant to uglify their exteriors. Laser scanners can be difficult to fit to stuccoed ceilings. Sensors may also have to be turned off during the daytime as crowds walk through a museum.

The timing of the Louvre raid, which occurred between 9.30am and 9.40am local time, was typical of recent thefts, Stürmann said. “There’s a good reason why thefts tend to happen at either start or end of day. It’s often 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 given robbers new methods with which to bypass protections. In the city, the thieves reached the museum’s upper level with a mobile equipment and breached a glass pane with a electric tool.

Elaine Sciolino said the conversation in France about the 232-year-old structure had mostly focused on crowd control in the past decade, and less on protection.

The museum has an in-house team of about fifty permanent emergency personnel, but their mission is mainly to protect the artworks from fires and water damage. “There isn't a quick reaction team,” Sciolino said. “Ultimately, the safety of the Louvre all comes down to government support and funding, and currently the nation lacks sufficient money.”