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Entering the planet's most popular museum in the middle of the day, taking eight items of invaluable historical gems and disappearing into the city traffic on simple scooters may seem like the most audacious of crimes, carried out for global fame and subsequent Hollywood film treatments.

Experts who observe trends in international art crime, however, see the recent robbery at the Louvre as something more prosaic: the latest in a series of smash-and-grab thefts centered more on the monetary worth of precious stones or metals than the historical importance, continuing a trend that has emerged over the last decade in Europe, the UK and the US. The location, they propose, would have been of secondary concern to the thieves.

“One might wonder why criminals who want to steal valuable jewellery are breaking into a world-famous museum rather than a Cartier store,” said Christopher A Marinello. “The answer is simple: it’s because nowadays a high-end boutique is more secure.”

A series of violent jewellery shop thefts indicate that many stores have strengthened their security in recent years, with armed guards on their locations and wares no longer kept on display overnight. Cultural institutions, meanwhile, look more exposed, in part because of the in-built factor of being accessible institutions in older structures, and also the current economic climate in many developed nations.

“Since Covid, authorities across the world have cut back on police and the arts funding,” noted Marinello. “With criminals entering the Louvre, it shows how vulnerable our museums have become. This is a horrible 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 containing nearly 2,000 diamonds and a hugely valuable crown once owned by a royal that the robbers dropped by the roadside on their way out – has naturally drawn comparisons with the historical theft of the famous painting from the Louvre, carried out by the worker Vincenzo Peruggia.

More relevant comparisons may be the 2019 theft of valuables from Dresden’s Green Vault Museum worth over €113m, the taking of a multi-million pound gold toilet from a UK landmark the that year, the 2017 heist of a large gold coin from a European museum or even a series of thefts of collector items from American institutions.

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

If the artefacts were to stay whole, experts say, the criminals would struggle to find a buyer. “There’s no way to trade something as immediately identifiable as the Louvre’s jewels on the licit market”, said Lynda Albertson of the a relevant organization.

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

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

“Taking a Picasso, it has to stay complete or it becomes valueless, and you have to conceive of a scheme to keep it in hiding, maybe by moving it among difficult criminal actors,” noted Marinello. “And you’re constantly exposed to the danger of an partner telling the police to cash in a ransom.”

For comparable factors, an investigator said it was highly improbable that the robbery had been ordered. “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 buy this, if you get caught, you go to jail. You can't display it to your acquaintances, you cannot bequeath it to your children.”

Modifying stolen works by melting down or re-cutting does lower the value. When it comes to diamonds, it also comes with considerable risk because contemporary cutting techniques give stones a larger and brighter surface area, and older-style stones would either attract notice or barter the price down for a concealment.

Crucially, however, melting down or re-cutting removes the proof of the crime. “I suspect that the robbers will try to take the stolen goods to locations with gem knowledge like a country, another nation or even as close as Antwerp, and locate an expert to remove the gems,” suggested Marinello.

The heist at the Louvre has already raised questions about security measures at the institution, with a unauthorized official review expected to be released next month criticising “significant” and “persistent” delays in updating equipment and observing that security cameras were lacking in multiple areas. 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.

“Historic buildings are much harder to secure,” explained Erin Thompson. “They often have large accessible windows that makes it easy for criminals to escape, and there may be preservation laws in place that mean you can’t fit them with secure windows.”

The most solid protective measures for structures should be conceptualised “like a fortress”, noted Peter Stürmann. “It should include multiple levels to deter intruders.”

Contemporary structures are equipped with advanced external CCTV cameras or in-built seismic detectors that raise alarm about a smashed window in real time, but old museums may be reluctant to alter their exteriors. Detection devices can be difficult to install to decorated surfaces. Motion and sound detectors may also have to be turned off during the day as crowds walk through a museum.

The schedule of the Louvre raid, which took place between morning hours local time, was typical of recent thefts, 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 actually act as extra protection.”

Technological progress may have introduced new gadgets that can notify more rapidly and effectively, but it has also provided robbers new methods with which to bypass security measures. In the city, the thieves reached the museum’s first-floor window with a mobile equipment and cut through a glass pane with a battery-powered disc cutter.

Elaine Sciolino said the conversation in France about the historic building had primarily focused on visitor management in recent years, and less on protection.

The institution has an on-site brigade of about 50 permanent firefighters, but their mission is mostly to safeguard the artworks from blazes and flooding. “There is no rapid-response unit,” Sciolino said. “Ultimately, the safety of the Louvre all depends on government support and money, and at present the nation simply has no money.”