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FBI Director Kash Patel revealed a slew of security concerns, including cyber threats, drones and the potential for lone-wolf attacks ahead of the World Cup, which will draw millions of visitors across North America.
Officials are expecting three million people to visit for the tournament, which will be jointly hosted by the U.S., Canada and Mexico. Out of the 104 total matches in the expanded 2026 World Cup, 78 games will be played in the U.S., while the remaining 26 will be split between its neighbors to the north and south.
Host countries are aggressively ramping up security and intelligence operations to safely stage the much-anticipated soccer matches across 11 U.S. host cities.
“It’s everything from traditional cop work going out to the streets, talking to communities and saying, ‘Hey, do you guys know of any bad actors? Have you heard of anyone that might want to do harm to people or venues?'” Patel told Fox News correspondent Brooke Taylor. “That’s our big security goal for us at the FBI.”
US PREPARES FOR INFLUX OF INTERNATIONAL VISITORS AHEAD OF WORLD CUP WITH SECURITY AT THE FOREFRONT
FBI Director Kash Patel outlined the top security concerns for the FBI ahead of the 2026 World Cup. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)
In an effort to foil any lone-wolf actors, the FBI has created a special operations center at its headquarters to centralize and analyze incoming data about potential threats.
“When we’re talking about cyber actors, those [are ones] that come in and hack our infrastructure and hold data hostage for monetary payments. So we are taking all of that information to one place and centralizing, at least for us at the FBI, at our headquarters component,” Patel said.
Patel added that outside of major nation-state adversaries like China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea, lone-wolf threats pose the greatest concern to national security.
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