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It’s less of an issue now with face recognition, but for years I was haranguing my mother and aunt over them using their birthdays as their phone passcodes. It’s a security feature — at least try to give would-be criminals a decent challenge! But I guess the joke’s on me, because all along my mother and aunt have been deploying anti-theft measures on par with the world’s most-visited museum. As you recall, the Louvre in Paris was (easily and quickly) robbed nearly three weeks ago when four thieves stole over $100 million worth of French crown jewels from the museum’s second floor Apollo Gallery, all in a tidy seven minutes. Days after the heist, the Louvre’s director went before the French Senate, giving testimony that essentially boiled down to, “It was only a matter of time.” It seems the security infrastructure of the museum is as out of date as it is underfunded. Still, there’s one key feature that could and should have been updated at no extra cost to the museum: not using “Louvre” as the password to the entire surveillance system. Merde.

President and director of the Louvre, Laurence des Cars, told the French Senate that the only camera installed outside the Apollo Gallery did not capture footage of the window where the thieves broke in and exited.

At the time of the heist, the password for the museum’s security system was “Louvre,” a museum employee with knowledge of the system told ABC News on Wednesday, Nov. 5. The French outlet Libération first reported on the password, citing confidential documents. According to the outlet, France’s National Cybersecurity Agency revealed the password in a 2014 audit.

Des Cars also told the French Senate last month that the museum’s perimeter security was weak “due to underinvestment.”

She said that she was “appalled” by the museum’s security when she took the role in 2021, and that it has been one of her top priorities, according to ABC News.

Additionally, Gérald Darmanin, a French politician serving as Minister of Justice, told France Inter radio that security protocols “failed” to prevent the four-person heist.

“[It’s] giving a deplorable image of France,” Darmanin added, “The French feel like they have been robbed.”

On Oct. 25, two men were arrested in connection with the robbery and “partially admitted their involvement in the events to investigators,” Laure Beccuau, the Paris Public Prosecutor, said during a press conference, according to ABC News.

The two men had been charged with organized robbery and conspiracy to commit a crime in connection with the heist, ABC News reported, citing the prosecutor. Both suspects have been remanded in custody and will remain in jail until their trial.

Over a week after the robbery, on Oct. 29, five new suspects were arrested, a Paris Prosecutor’s Office spokesperson said in an email to PEOPLE on Oct. 30. At the time of the arrest, the missing jewels had not yet been recovered.

If convicted, the suspects could face a prison sentence of up to 15 years and heavy fines, according to ABC News.

[From People]

I gave des Cars a ribbing after she spoke to the Senate, particularly over the revelation that the lone camera appointed to the Apollo Gallery was pointing in the wrong freaking direction. That detail — on top of her descriptive accounting of the various ways in which the museum building is not adequately fortified — seemed like she was just asking more robbers to stop by for looting. But learning that the surveillance system’s password was “Louvre” makes me wonder if instead the thieves (easily and quickly) hacked into the system and programmed the camera to look the wrong way. However, this new info does not exonerate the museum from the crime of selecting a password so stupidly obvious! Mon dieu. Just so we’re all on the same page, consider this a friendly (yet slightly judgmental) reminder that the goal of a password is for it to be something other people won’t figure out. (And in all fairness to my mother, she did finally make a passcode different from her birthday. In all fairness to me, I decoded the new one fairly quickly.)

As for the heart of this crime, the jewels, I’m worried that enough time has elapsed that they won’t ever be recovered. Of course it’s good that French authorities have made the arrests, but it’s still a big loss. And speaking of, I have to highlight this quote from the Minister of Justice: “The French feel like they’ve been robbed.” Monsieur, that is literally what happened! They feel that way because it IS that way!

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Photos credit: Getty and Mark Fairhurst/Avalon, Gwendoline Le Goff/Avalon