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Breaking into the world’s most-visited museum in broad daylight, grabbing eight pieces of priceless Napoleonic jewellery and disappearing into Paris traffic on simple scooters may seem like the boldest of crimes, carried out for international notoriety and subsequent movie adaptations.

Specialists who observe patterns in global cultural theft, however, see Sunday morning’s robbery at the Louvre as a more practical matter: the latest in a string of quick-hit thefts centered more on the material value of valuable gems or materials than the artifacts’ significance, continuing a trend that has appeared over the last ten years in Germany, Britain and the US. The location, they propose, would have been of lesser importance to the criminals.

“You may ask why thieves who want to steal valuable jewellery are breaking into a world-famous museum rather than a luxury jewelry store,” stated Christopher A Marinello. “The answer is simple: it’s because these days a Cartier store is more secure.”

A series of violent retail store thefts mean that many outlets have strengthened their protection in recent years, with security personnel on their premises and merchandise no longer shown overnight. Museums, meanwhile, look more exposed, partly because of the inherent reason of being public-facing institutions in historic buildings, and partly the financial situation in many western countries.

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

The robbery of the objects – featuring jewelry pieces made up of eight sapphires and 631 diamonds, the crown of Empress Eugénie containing 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 naturally drawn comparisons with the 1911 theft of the famous painting from the Louvre, performed by the worker Vincenzo Peruggia.

Better comparisons may be the 2019 theft of jewellery from a German institution worth over millions, the theft of a multi-million pound valuable object from Blenheim Palace the same year, the 2017 robbery of a valuable item from Berlin’s Bode Museum or even a spate of robberies of sports memorabilia from US mining museums.

“It's a clear trend here,” said Marinello. “Smash, grab, and melt it down as quickly as possible.”

If the items were to stay whole, specialists say, the thieves would find it hard to find a buyer. “It's impossible to trade something as recognizable as the museum's gems on the licit market”, said Lynda Albertson of the Association for Research into Crimes against Art.

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

In the past, institutions 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 widely publicised, the storage and sale of taken items is dangerous for any lawbreaker.

“Taking a famous painting, it has to remain intact or it becomes valueless, and you have to conceive of a scheme to keep it in hiding, perhaps by passing it around dangerous individuals,” noted Marinello. “And you’re constantly exposed to the danger of an accomplice telling the police to collect a ransom.”

For comparable factors, an investigator said it was highly improbable that the theft had been commissioned. “Commissioned theft is something from Hollywood movies,” he said. “Nobody would touch this. It’s all around the world and in all the media. If you acquire these, if you get caught, you end up in prison. You can't display it to your acquaintances, you cannot leave it to your children.”

Altering stolen works by dismantling or reshaping does reduce the worth. When it comes to diamonds, it also comes with significant danger because modern cutting techniques give stones a larger and brighter appearance, and older-style stones would either draw unwanted attention or barter the price down for a concealment.

Importantly, however, melting down or re-cutting removes the evidence of the theft. “My guess is that the robbers will try to bring the stolen goods to places with diamond expertise like a country, another nation or even as close as Antwerp, 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 unauthorized official review expected to be published next month pointing out “significant” and “ongoing” slow progress in updating systems and observing that surveillance were lacking in multiple areas. But security experts say showing precious items in older structures with a steady stream of visitors comes with dangers that are not possible to remove entirely.

“Historic buildings are much harder to protect,” explained an art crime professor. “Many of them have large accessible windows that makes it easy for thieves to get away, and there may be preservation laws in place that mean you are unable to install them with secure windows.”

The most solid protective measures for buildings should be conceptualised “like a fortress”, noted a security advisor. “There should be several layers to deter attackers.”

Modern buildings are fitted with advanced surveillance systems or integrated vibration sensors that raise alarm about a smashed window in real time, but historic institutions may be hesitant to alter their appearance. Detection devices can be hard to install to decorated surfaces. Sensors may also have to be turned off during the daytime as crowds walk through a museum.

The schedule of the robbery, which took place between morning hours in Paris, was common of modern robberies, Stürmann said. “There’s a good reason why robberies tend to happen at either start or end of day. It’s often when security change their shifts and before the museum is full of visitors who actually act as extra protection.”

Advances in technology may have thrown up new gadgets that can raise the alarm more quickly and effectively, but it has also provided robbers new tools with which to circumvent security measures. In the city, the robbers accessed the museum’s upper level with a mobile equipment and breached a glass pane with a electric tool.

An author said the discussion in the country about the 232-year-old structure had mostly focused on visitor management in the past decade, and not as much on protection.

The institution has an in-house brigade of about 50 full-time firefighters, but their mission is mostly to safeguard the artworks from fires and flooding. “There isn't a quick reaction team,” Sciolino said. “Ultimately, the security of the Louvre all depends on government support and money, and currently the nation simply has no money.”