Toronto and Vancouver go all out for safety and security
By Sarah B. Hood
To call the global men’s soccer championship a big undertaking barely describes the massive logistical exercise that will bring a record 48 national teams and their entourages to Vancouver and Toronto, along with some 350,000 visitors and droves of media and dignitaries over the 39-day tournament.
Although Canada’s host cities boast solid bench strength in handling major sports events—like Vancouver’s 2010 Winter Olympics and Toronto’s 2025 MLB World Series—hosting the global soccer showdown promises to build valuable new expertise in safety and security.
GLOBAL COORDINATION
In an October 2025 presentation to the Event Safety Alliance Conference, Peter Code, the tournament’s executive director of Safety & Security Canada, described international planning, underway since early 2024.
“This is the most comprehensive method of planning a tournament such as this, one amongst three different nations, all doing things a little bit differently, but absolutely consistent,” he said. Global coordination will introduce some measures not yet familiar in many sports venues across Canada, like secure turnstiles at stadium entrances.
Canada’s central coordinating bodies are the event’s Toronto and Vancouver Secretariats. Each has an integrated safety and security unit coordinating a dizzyingly complex network of stakeholders such as federal, provincial and municipal governments; police and fire services; facilities managers; public health boards and hospitals; transportation and transit authorities; public utilities, and their counterparts in other host cities.
MANAGING RISK
Protocols focus on risk assessment, emergency preparedness and communication strategies. In December, crisis management firm The Ackerman Group published a security assessment that finds threats of targeted attacks in Canada around the tournament to be low. However, it flags petty or violent crime, political protests and, potentially, fan behaviour.
Brazil-based risk specialist Luiz Guilherme Carvalho also published an extensive risk-management analysis last October. With the surge of AI capabilities, he believes that both good and bad actors will have unprecedented access to digital tools for protecting or infiltrating communications and commercial functions.
He estimates Canada’s direct security expenditures to be “$180 million distributed between federal agencies led by the RCMP and provincial/municipal authorities.”
The Vancouver Host Committee states “We’ve assessed potential hazards, identified capability gaps, and built those findings directly into our operational and contingency plans. This preparation ensures we can respond quickly and in a unified way to both expected and unexpected situations.”
SHARING INTELLIGENCE
At the Event Safety Alliance Conference, Code discussed some security measures. At the global level, each host city will receive dossiers on national teams and their fans, highlighting everything from on-field rivalries to potential geopolitical disagreements. Cities are sharing intelligence, and police officers from some competing countries will attend in a civilian capacity to monitor and advise on their nation’s supporters.
They will be especially useful in helping host cities predict pop-up fan marches, which can mobilize thousands of excited supporters unexpectedly in public places. Around the stadiums, “behaviour detection officers” will circulate unobtrusively to keep an eye on the mood of the crowds. Stadium security will be trained in the European model of “stewards.”
“When you go to a European football match, you will very rarely see police officers,” Code told conference delegates. “What you will see is stewards—professionals at what they do, and they are respected, listened to and incredibly effective. I think that will have a huge legacy impact in relation to safety and security.”
In addition, specially trained human rights and anti-discrimination units will watch for flags, banners, songs or chants that go beyond friendly competition into the territory of inappropriate discrimination.
The world’s biggest soccer tournament “represents
a watershed moment in international security
cooperation and mega-event risk management.”
—Luiz Guilherme Carvalho
SAFE STREETS
“Last mile” is a key concept in managing crowd movement; it means concentrating on routes between major transit hubs and venues. Toronto, for instance, is prioritizing walking, cycling, rideshare and public transit around Toronto Stadium and FanFest, with wayfinding signage and volunteer guides. Some street closures will be in effect in both Toronto and Vancouver, especially on match days.
Vancouver has introduced a temporary bylaw that will apply for several weeks around key venues, restricting noise, graffiti, street vending and street performance. The city is also installing about 200 temporary surveillance cameras. Through an agreement estimated to cost just under $13 million, TELUS Communications will provide digital infrastructure for extensive Wi-Fi, Internet and closed-circuit television.
The sport’s international governing authority requires a safety perimeter around match and training sites, with vehicle and pedestrian screening. In addition, Code said, team hotels will have security apparatus and 24-hour security personnel. He also noted that consultants have been retained to produce crowd simulation models for official sites to ensure smooth arrival and dispersal of large groups.
PUBLIC HEALTH
With crowds of travellers come public-health risks. In September 2025, Public Health Ontario released its Hazard Identification and Risk Assessment, which identifies “moderate” risk factors (measles, foodborne diseases and COVID) and recommends pre-event monitoring of global epidemiology trends, planning for potential surge capacity, enhanced surveillance during the tournament and educational messaging.
In October, Toronto Public Health (TPH) published a similar analysis of top health threats. The agency is preparing a comprehensive operational plan for the event that includes the activation of an Incident Management Team and coordination with Emergency Operations Centres.
TPH is also educating healthcare workers, food handlers and the public with tools like a new food-safety portal for vendors and organizers. It will be monitoring wastewater and other indicators of infectious disease. Meanwhile, Health Canada has published travel health notices for the international soccer finals, advising visitors to use sensible precautions like handwashing hygiene and vaccinations.
A LEGACY OF SAFETY
The training and professional development, the physical equipment and the infrastructure for international collaboration that have been set up for the tournament will long outlast it.
The Vancouver Host Committee states that “Through our planning efforts, we’re strengthening interagency and inter-government communications and information-sharing systems. We’re also enhancing technical expertise and specialized capabilities in areas such as crowd management, cybersecurity, threat detection and emergency responses. This work will generate long-term benefits that will enrich Vancouver’s approach to venue and sport event security and create a more agile and cohesive security environment.”
The world’s biggest soccer tournament “represents a watershed moment in international security cooperation and mega-event risk management,” writes Carvalho, “presenting challenges and opportunities that will reshape the landscape of large-scale event security for generations to come.”
Published March 2026
