← The Watch Floor with Sarah Adams
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Welcome to the watch for I'm Sarah Adams. Today we're going to talk about the threat environment that's surrounding the 2026 FIFA World cup as it's already looking. You know, from a security perspective, this is shaping up to be one of the most complex sporting environments ever. When we're talking about kind of the protection side of it, and it's not because of, like, one singular threat. It's this fear of convergence of threats. When we talk about convergence, we're just talking about, you know, multiple threat streams occurring at once. Remember, this is happening all across North America, in China, in the United States, and in Mexico, which is already facing its own issues. Foreign. So when we look at the 2026 FIFA World cup, this is the largest World cup that's ever been conducted. So besides being in, you know, three different countries, we have 48 national teams involved. We have 104 different matches. There's 16 host cities. I mean, this is pretty larger saying, you know, the event will bring in 6.5 to 7 million people spectators, but also each city is likely to bring in up to a million visitors as well, because not everybody just comes to watch the game. There's so many different events occurring around it, including fan zones, et cetera. So as you can imagine, that really peaks in certain cities. And it's hard for some cities to take on kind of this massive influx. And then, of course, when we're looking at the finale at the MetLife Stadium, that's supposed to be one of the largest international gatherings ever hosted in the United States. So this is a very big lift when we're talking about from a security perspective. So don't just think the numbers of fans in attendance. We need to talk and think about density. And we've talked about this previously when we talked about the Super Bowl. So some of these fan events that occur outside the stadiums, they can bring in 50 to 100,000 fans each. And then every different stadium and every different city, as you can imagine, has a different security posture, different missions, different issues. There's a lot of other soft targets in the area. We got airports, we have metro stations, we have rail lines, there's hotels, obviously, there's a lot of nightlife districts that people are going to be going to. There's different event quarters set up, there's fan zones, hospitality zones, then you just have the normal things. Highways, we have border crossings, we have digital infrastructure. There's always a huge cyberpeace and then just any sort of public gathering places in the vicinity of these locations. So it's not like you're just focusing on protecting the state stadium. It's all these kind of concentric rings that are occurring around it now. All of this is also unfolding in one of the most unstable geopolitical periods in recent times. Of course, we have this escalation with Iran and Iran has multiple times brought up the World cup in a threat capacity. We have persistent terrorist propaganda, especially a lot of the push for lone actors saying grab a knife, ram a car, go into these crowds and we're going to see more and more of it as we get close to the event. It was just the same messaging we saw in the lead up to the Olympics. We also have a lot of domestic political polarization in our country alone and this increase in domestic terrorism. There's other issues like the rapid drone proliferation. You're now worrying not just about threats on the ground, but threats from the air. We have this extreme expand its cyber warfare capability. And we are in a lot of these tense times with some of our adversaries and it's easier for them to do a cyber operation and keep a hitting hand by doing something that one would call kinetic on the ground. And then we have this kind of decentralized online radicalization pipeline occurring. And it's not just the normalist terrorists radicalizing people. We've seen recently with the attack on the San Diego mosque that there's some right wing like terror Graham as being a really good example. Ottawaffen brigade has long done this. And so there's a lot of different outlets left, right, Islamist terrorists, et cetera, radicalizing young people in this country. And of course that is its own risk and threat factor that I don't even think we're completely on top of or aware of yet to deal with. But that is just a whole, whole nother vector that comes into play here. This episode is brought to you by dose for cholesterol. One of the things we've been talking about more lately is how people are starting to pay closer attention to the habits they build into their daily routine, especially when it comes to things like cholesterol support. 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All these type of things are going to show up in messaging around it on the field, right? Because everybody wants to kind of plant their fruit and make their statement. And that can also, as you can imagine, kind of affect the situation around these incidents. The biggest issue when it comes to the World cup is not exactly the protection of the stadium. The stadiums usually have the most protection. And so a bad actor will usually look for a softer target near it, as you can imagine, because around a stadium you have heavy police presence, there's federal coordination, there's behavioral Detection teams, there's counter drone surveillance. There's of course different layers where they check your credentials. There's restricted airspace, there's vehicle barriers, we have explosive screening. And then of course these massive intelligence fusion centers that come in and assist it. So the real vulnerabilities then are outside of this hardened perimeter. So in those fan zones that we talked about in live watch parties, in these transit hubs being the metro station, the bus station or even the airport terminals, there's where hotels are clustered that a lot of fans are staying in, different evening and entertainment districts, these parking facilities, any kind of pedestrian choke points or even like the rideshare pickup zones. So when you talk about these type of environments, they are where a bad actor wants to target mostly because they bring in that high density. There's lower security thresholds in these areas. There's like this constant movement. You know, there's always going to be someone there. There's limited screening and of course the public is able to go in this area. You know, it's less sensitive. You don't need any sort of ticket. You know, any fan can show up and enjoy some of these outside activities. So when we talk about crowd density, you know, it's a word people say, but there is like math behind it. So a crowd is dense once there's six to eight people per square meter. And then as you can imagine, as it becomes more dense, you lose almost like this independent movement of control. And then that's where we get some of the bigger issues, right, where these kind of crowd crushes occur. You know, panic can spread pretty fast. Sometimes it's just social media amplification. It could be a loud noise, online rumors, drone sighting. It could be the false report of gunfire and suddenly thousands of people are moving simultaneously. This is a very, very dangerous situation. We saw this during the 2022 Champions League final in Paris. If you remember this. There was massive cross crowd congestion outside of the stadium. People got crushed, there was bottlenecks, there was robberies. There's kind of this widespread panic and thousands of supporters got compressed into these like corridors and criminals literally came through and were like assaulting people and stealing them while they were all jammed together. It was this crazy thing that a bad actor was to able, able to take advantage of because of the density. And when you have this compression and no sort of crowd control and then just the misinformation going around, a little bit of that panic in a situation like this, you can become a really easy target pretty fast. Now when we talk about the United States portion of this event. That's where we have, I think, the highest threat of kind of the thing we talk about the most, like this lone actor threat that can occur in and around a stadium. And a lot of people think, and it happens usually this way, that this can come from online radicalization, usually like ISIS material or Al Qaeda material. But as I told you, left wing and right wing groups are doing this and a lot of them are just putting stuff out like go cause disruptions, whole protests, those type of things that of course can escalate into situations. So in the US we already have a number of concerning things going on, right? We have of course these problems with mass shootings. We have these persistent extremist ecosystems. We have this online radicalization that's not going away. We have this problem where there are large numbers of known Islamist terrorists on US soil that we have not deported. So when you have all of this in play, there are multiple issues. There is lone actor, there is the fear of a coordinated attack, there is fear of people just taking advantage of the situation, could be politically motivated, et cetera. And so when you look at the World cup, if you're just looking at it from an attacker perspective, obviously there's the international media attention, right? You do something, it's going to be the number one news item out there. And that's sometimes all someone wants. Another thing is there's this symbolic value of this is supposed to bring the international community together, right? We're supposed to be a partnership in this, right? And you can break that. Another thing is this dense civilian concentration. You know, a lot of people are going to be there and you can predict when they're going to be there. And you're even going to know when the crowds are going to be moving the most, right? Because of course there's set times and schedules. Also there's just some emotional intensity around something like this. Some people are very passionate about the World cup and their teams or like representing their nationality and all that plays in. And they're all things bad actors like to exploit. This episode is brought to you by Pocket Hose, the world's number one expandable hose. 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Just text watch to 64,000. That's watch to 64,000 for you. Two free gifts at purchase. Watch to 64,000. Message and data rates apply. Now, talking about the threat in and around a stadium, I want to walk through it a bit so it seems simpler to understand. It's this concept of anywhere a crowd can compress, a bad actor might look to target. So a lot of this is psychological. It's not always about killing as many people as possible. It's like, how many can we impact? And that sometimes gets forgotten because just hitting a World cup event is already a massive international incident. Now if we remember back to the 2015 Paris attacks, we're always saying to go back to this as a case example, they attacked the area around the Stain de France. They chose not to actually attack the football stadium. They said, hey, there's plenty of people in the restaurants, in the cafes and the entertainment halls, except, et cetera. We still can do mass casualty without going straight at the stadium, which is a harder target. Why not hit the softer targets and amplify kind of the fear and extend the attack outward. So it's very smart thinking. We have to remember the enemy thinks this way. They aren't going to go straight at the hardest target. Why would they when there's 50,000 people in a fan zone that that has no kind of metal detectors and no security guards standing outside of it? I mean, it's just this constant weighing of things. Terrorists are always going to try to prolong an event, right? Try not to be prevented. If they get blocked right at the main entrance of an event and maybe kill one security guard, right? That's a failure to them. So we have to think those things through. Now another thing that's really interesting is I talked about how there's always this online radicalization saying lone actors do this and that. But also last year and we had put a video talking about this is Al Qaeda's Indo subcontinent released a propaganda video, but it was actually to bring in recruits. A lot of it was saying, hey, you know, fellow Muslims, you have gotten way too far away from the cause of jihad, right? You are living these Western lifestyles. You should be thinking this through. You know, we're not trying to judge you. We're giving you opportunity to take a step back from that lifestyle and come be with us, train with us, and, you know, live this life, you know, where you honor those who came before you and be part of this grand jihad. Well, in it, it was very interesting because they did show people enjoying the 2022 World cup in Doha, saying, hey, you were out there as fans. You know, you're in these fan zones. Actually showed some of the fan zones. They showed people doing the public transportation to the event, and they said, why do you want to be a part of this Western culture? Right? That's not where your mindset should be. And it's one of those things we should think about, because the terrorists are looking at something like the World cup as being a universe completely detached and separate from the one they want, right? From the caliphate they want, from the future they want for their women and their children. And we have to remember how they view these things, because sometimes it's so hard to think like a terrorist. But they're constantly thinking of ways to harm us and in new ways and in different ways and in ways that divide us. And so we just have to keep that in mind, because, hey, if we can't keep these international partners here safe on our soil, whether playing soccer or what does that look like? What does that mean? That can get a lot of traction on the terrorist side of things. Now, we can't separate Iran from anything right now because, of course, we have this escalation with them, and they might want to take advantage of things. Now. It doesn't exactly mean they'll do an attack, but they can. They can mobilize their proxies. The best thing they can do, as you can imagine, is some sort of cyber operations, because then they can keep more of a hidden hand. They. They can try to put up messaging and inspire lone actors, just like anybody else does, like ISIS would. They also, though, would view this as some sort of symbolic attack, and it is a soft target, and we have to keep that in mind. So attackers are constantly, you know, looking for what we can take advantage of, like we said, kind of for this media amplification, but also economic disruption. So right now, Iran feels we're disrupting Their economy. Now, if they decide, hey, we have every right in the defense of our country, that's the way they frame it, to also disrupt the economy of the United States, they might choose that. So you have to keep that in mind. There's also, of course, public fear that comes into place around something like this. And then all the symbolism. So we World cup really kind of puts all that on a platter for a bad actor. Everything they want out of an attack you can accomplish if you hit one of these events, if they chose to do something like this. Now, when we talk though, about someone really doing an attack, it's not like Iran is the top of the list. It's more these lone inspired actors, proxy aligned sympathizers. Not exactly Iran going to a proxy and saying, can I have this attack? But a proxy being like, we got to do something for the government of Iran. They're in this tough spot. Another main threat actor is these opportunists. Hey, I'm an extremist. Doesn't matter. Left, right, Islamist, doesn't matter. Heck, you could be environmental extremists. Let's take advantage of the situation now because it's presented in front of us and then of course, any sort of online mobilization campaigns. Obviously, the online mobilization right now we're seeing isn't exactly at the level of a terrorist attack. We're seeing like things like these teen takeovers. But look how fast those things mobilize. You do have to watch for those type of things because it is a new trend and it can bring in a lot of people at one time and, and quickly affect the density. And that's one of the biggest problems we have around this event. Now, terrorism attacks, political messaging aside, of course, around these type of events, there's always crime. Crime is your biggest threat if you attend one, obviously, because a lot of these criminal networks and actors know, hey, we can go to this event. People are distracted, they're unfamiliar with this environment. They're not from the city. They're definitely carrying some sort of valuables, right? Their phone, maybe cameras, cash. They're traveling within crowds and they're often intoxicated, right? So leaves for this great targeting environment if you're a criminal. Now, the crimes we usually see in the most likely is always pickpocketing. But there's then phone theft, there's different financial frauds, there's counterfeit tickets, vehicle burglaries, different rideshare scams. You'll be very careful with those. ATM skimming, credential theft. Obviously, we've Talked about this on the show previously. Human trafficking around these events, and then anybody taking advantage of kind of in the nightlife space, just theft, drugging your drinks, et cetera. Now, the criminal crews do certain targets, and they do focus on things, right? There's been previous events. We can look at the statistics of what they like to focus on. So they like to see people who are leaving events. They like people who are boarding public transportation, like the train or the metro. They love people who are waiting for rideshares. They like when people are starting to enter into a hotel and then anyone moving around through these, like, crowded nightlife zones, zones where, of course, there's a lot of alcohol. We can't talk about the threat environment and not talk about the issue with Mexico. So Mexico has its own layer of complexity, obviously. And the biggest issue besides these criminal networks, every other issue we talked about is, of course, a threat when we talk about Mexico. But we also then have these narco terrorist organizations, the CJNG being kind of the biggest threat actor in this space that we have to watch for, because obviously they're a militarized criminal organization and they have had a lot of capabilities. They have things like armored vehicles, they have explosive drones, they have high caliber weapons. They have drone capability, they have drones, different encrypted communications. They have coordinated assault teams. Right. I mean, it is like a military unit. So obviously, most cartel violence isn't directed at tourists. And then everybody just goes their merry way and say, oh, I'm a tourist. They're not going to bother me. But you have to remember there still can be situations you can end up in because of the cartel violence. And if we learned anything from earlier this year, in February, after the El Mencho operation, you know, they came out in full force. People got stuck in their hotels. There was roadblocks, spillover violence, carjackings. We had different extortion vehicles set on fire. You know, there was fears around shooting in the streets. Right. All that happened so quickly. You know, the Guadalajara airport had to be evacuated. So we have to remember, yes, they prefer not to target tourists, but it doesn't mean you might not be in the wrong place the wrong time. So don't think of cartels as, like, positioning different operations to target the World Cup. That is not what's happening. It's just they might create an environment that's unstable. And now you're in it. There's large crowds, there's a lot of people not from that area, and things can get out of hand fast. And that's why we're always talking about this convergence of events. Obviously, in events this large, the biggest issue is the transportation systems. And they're really the largest vulnerability because they're kind of like this vein into all the events is the best way to put it. So we've talked about how there's the airport terminal, buses, et cetera. But what people get worried about is different, like bottlenecks at the security portion of these, different platform congestion. Pedestrian tunnels can be an issue, different kind of approach routes towards venues because it's pretty bottlenecked. Highway gridlock, airport surges, you know, all of those things become issues. And again, they have a lot of density within them. You know, it wasn't during a sporting event, but the Madrid train bombings in 2004 were really focused on hitting transportation. At the moment it was the most dense. And that's why they killed 193 people and they injured over 2,000. Right, because they hit it exactly when they thought the numbers would be highest. The Same happened in 2005 during the London transit bombings. They hit it at rush hour, hoping for mass carnage. So you have to remember around the World cup you get a lot of these things that you would have if you were watching and monitoring public transportation. So you get predictability of times. You get to see when density is the highest, you see when people's movement's constrained. And then of course, there's just the psychological vulnerability if people are in these little tubes and they have no control over the situation. They're packed in, they can barely move. And that affects. Affects obviously people's response time, their thinking, et cetera. The last piece I want to talk about quick is of course the cyber threats and the drone threats, because we can't ignore them. Cyber is something that usually occurs like an attack at every major event. Now, these systems at these events are highly connected. And then as you can imagine, there's so many other things. So we have electronic tickets, credentialing, there's a lot of financial transactions, there's different broadcast systems, there's hotel systems, there's transportation management, emergency alerts, there's different venue access control. So a cyber attack really sometimes only has a hit one of those to cause a disruption. So it makes it a lot easier when you cause a disruption. It can just be confusion, delayed emergency response time, which we're always concerned about failures and credentials. Right. The high value people can't get in the venue, though. That's going to be a big problem. Different crowd panic. You can spread misinformation. So Quickly, and then you can just paralyze the transit around this. If you remember, during the 2018 Winter Games, kind of Russian military linked hackers put out this malware known as Olympic Destroyer. I mean, very creative of them, right? And it affected Olympic IT systems, the Internet connectivity, and then that credential infrastructure that we talked about. So this digital ecosystem can be a lot easier for a bad actor to target. Obviously, drone threats have evolved massively since the last World Cup. So it's almost like you're starting from scratch when you're planning for this one. So we all know these drones are inexpensive, they're widely available, there's increasing capability. And when you have a drone, let's say it enters this restricted airspace, it can automatically cause panic. There's event suspension, because nobody knows what this is. There's then crowd movements, everybody wants to get out of the way. There's airspace shutdowns that occur. And then of course, the police have to mobilize. If you Remember back in 2018, there were all these kind of unauthorized excursions at the Gatwick Airport in the United Kingdom. And it disrupted traffic and really affect 140,000 passengers because there is no, like explosives on it, nothing like that. But nobody knew who they belonged to, where they're coming from, what the goal was. So you have to usually then make the safest choice, right, for the people there. And then it can impact a lot of people. And so we have to keep in mind, it's even just the idea of a threat. It doesn't even have to have a threat component attached to it. The real threat picture here is again this concept of convergence. What are all the overlapping risks and how are they affecting each other? You would look at the transportation systems, the hospitality district, these fan zones, the cyber infrastructure, of course, the nightlife areas, anything that touches this digital ecosystem. And then of course, any space where the public is going to gather in and around these events. Because in these modern threat environments we're in, disruption itself becomes strategic. You know, people panic long before they even see a weapon. Perception can become that weapon, and fear sometimes spreads further, faster than the incident itself. And that's exactly why understanding the threat environment matters so much. Thanks for being here today on the watch floor.