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Breaking into the planet's most popular museum in the middle of the day, grabbing eight items of invaluable historical gems and vanishing into the city traffic on simple scooters may seem like the boldest of crimes, executed for international notoriety and ensuing Hollywood film treatments.

Experts who study trends in international art crime, however, see Sunday morning’s robbery at the Louvre as something more prosaic: the latest in a series of smash-and-grab thefts focused more on the monetary worth of precious stones or metals than the artifacts’ significance, continuing a pattern that has appeared over the last decade in Europe, Britain and the US. The venue, they propose, would have been of lesser importance to the criminals.

“You may ask 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 high-end boutique is better protected.”

A series of aggressive jewellery shop thefts indicate that many outlets have strengthened their protection in the past few years, with security personnel on their premises and merchandise no longer kept on display overnight. Museums, on the other hand, look more exposed, in part because of the in-built reason of being public-facing institutions in older structures, and also the current economic climate in many developed nations.

“Since Covid, governments across the globe have cut back on law enforcement and the culture sector,” said Marinello. “If thieves can get into the Louvre, it demonstrates how vulnerable our institutions have become. This is a horrible time to be a museum.”

The robbery of the items – including jewelry pieces made up of eight sapphires and 631 diamonds, the crown of a historical figure containing thousands of diamonds and a hugely valuable crown once owned by Napoleon III’s wife 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, performed by the Italian handyman the thief.

More relevant points of reference may be the recent burglary of jewellery from Dresden’s Green Vault Museum worth over millions, the theft of a multi-million pound valuable object from a UK landmark the same year, the recent robbery of a valuable item from Berlin’s Bode Museum or even a series of thefts of collector items from US mining museums.

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

If the items were to remain intact, experts say, the criminals would find it hard to find a buyer. “There’s no way to trade something as recognizable as the Louvre’s jewels on the legal marketplace”, commented an art crime researcher of the a relevant organization.

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

In the previous years, museums were often hesitant to announce publicly about the disappearance of well-known art pieces and would stay silent out of embarrassment. Now, as cultural robberies are more reported on, the storage and sale of taken items is dangerous for any criminal.

“Taking a famous painting, it has to remain intact or it becomes worthless, and you have to conceive of a scheme to conceal it, perhaps by passing it around dangerous individuals,” noted Marinello. “And you’re constantly exposed to the risk of an partner informing authorities 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 newspapers. If you buy this, if you are apprehended, you go to jail. You cannot show it to your acquaintances, you cannot bequeath it to your family.”

Altering taken items by dismantling or re-cutting does reduce the worth. When it comes to gems, it also comes with significant danger because contemporary cutting techniques give stones a bigger and brighter appearance, and older-style stones would either draw unwanted attention or reduce value for a concealment.

Crucially, however, melting down or reshaping removes the evidence of the crime. “My guess is that the Louvre thieves will try to bring the stolen goods to places with diamond expertise like a country, another nation or even as close as a city, and find someone to cut out the gems,” suggested Marinello.

The robbery at the Louvre has already brought up concerns about security measures at the institution, with a leaked official review expected to be published soon pointing out “considerable” and “persistent” slow progress in updating equipment and observing that security cameras were missing in multiple areas. But security experts say displaying precious items in historic buildings with a constant flow of guests comes with dangers that are impossible to remove entirely.

“Older structures are much harder to protect,” said an art crime professor. “Many of them have nice big street-facing windows that makes it easy for thieves to get away, and there may be building protection statutes in place that mean you can’t fit them with proper bulletproof glass.”

The best protective measures for structures should be designed “like a fortress”, noted Peter Stürmann. “It should include multiple levels to deter attackers.”

Modern buildings are fitted with advanced surveillance systems or integrated seismic detectors that alert about a broken glass in real time, but old museums may be reluctant to uglify their exteriors. 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 stomp through a museum.

The timing of the robbery, which occurred between morning hours local time, was typical of modern robberies, 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 crowded who actually act as additional security staff.”

Technological progress may have thrown up new gadgets that can notify more rapidly and efficiently, but it has also provided robbers new tools with which to bypass protections. In the city, the robbers reached the museum’s first-floor window with a mobile equipment and cut through a window with a electric tool.

An author said the discussion in France about the 232-year-old building had primarily centered on crowd control in the past decade, and not as much on protection.

The institution has an in-house team of about 50 permanent emergency personnel, but their purpose is mainly to protect the collection from fires and water damage. “There isn't a rapid-response unit,” Sciolino said. “Ultimately, the security of the Louvre all comes down to government support and money, and at present the nation simply has no resources.”