Getting our head in the game: Preparing for trafficking risks at the World Cup

By STOP THE TRAFFIK, 30 June 2026

The FIFA World Cup 2026 has arrived in North America – and with it, an extraordinary opportunity. Hundreds of thousands of fans have descended on host cities. Billions more are watching from home. Hotels have filled. Demand for services has spiked. And, as we have seen time and time again at major global sporting events, so has the risk of human trafficking and exploitation.

At STOP THE TRAFFIK, we have spent years building the tools, partnerships, and intelligence networks needed to respond to exactly these moments. The 2026 World Cup isn’t just a sporting event to us – it’s a critical window for prevention. And we’re ready.

Major sporting events and trafficking risks: What the patterns tell us

It may seem counterintuitive: when the world is watching, exploitation should be harder to hide. Yet trafficking often increases during major global events. A rapid surge in demand, combined with overstretched systems and insufficient safeguards, creates conditions in which exploitation can flourish.

When a city hosts a major sporting event like the World Cup, two forms of exploitation tend to rise:

• Sexual exploitation: A surge in visitors creates increased demand for commercial sexual services. Traffickers move victims into host cities in the weeks and days leading up to major events, exploiting the anonymity of a transient population and hotels at capacity.
• Labour exploitation: The construction, hospitality, and service industries see massive expansions before and during major events. Workers – often migrants with precarious visa status or limited language skills – can be recruited under false pretences and find themselves in exploitative conditions. More specifically, the demand for additional staff in hotels, bars, and restaurants is supplemented by cheap labour, creating a prime business opportunity for traffickers, particularly in supply chains where ethical standards are difficult to enforce.

This pattern isn’t new: the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar brought not only 3.4 million fans from every corner of the globe, but also a distinct increase in Adult Service Websites (ASWs) and labour exploitation in the hospitality sector. Similarly, the 2024 Paris Olympics saw a significant uptick in commercial sexual exploitation in the months both leading up to and during the event.

FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022

Implementing a multilingual, geo-targeted digital awareness campaign aimed at World Cup attendees and residents in Qatar, STOP THE TRAFFIK and It’s a Penalty launched prevention materials across digital platforms, spotlighting fans in high-traffic locations and event-related zones.
The campaign produced the following results:

• 58% of respondents agreed that the campaign increased their awareness of exploitation
• 65% reported improved knowledge of how to spot the signs of exploitation
• 45% took preventative action after seeing the campaign
• 68% confirmed they would begin taking preventative action because of the campaign

These findings demonstrate an improved understanding of exploitation and translated awareness, thereby strengthening public vigilance and expanding access to reporting mechanisms during periods of elevated risks.

Paris 2024 Olympics

Building on our work in Qatar, STOP THE TRAFFIK highlighted trends of human trafficking related to sexual exploitation during the Paris 2024 Olympics. Through data scrapes of ASWs in Paris before and during the Olympics, STOP THE TRAFFIK revealed several key insights, highlighting the staggering increases in exploitation during intense, albeit brief, market opportunities:

• Between March and July 2024, we found a 100% increase in ASWs adverts in France.
• An estimated €500 million was generated in commercial sexual exploitation between March and September 2024.
• A suspicious phone number analysed by our Intelligence Team was linked to over 300 ASWs in Paris.
• 80% of the ASW adverts promoted ‘in-call’ services, commonly associated with short-term rental properties and hotels.

Why the 2026 World Cup is a particularly important moment

The 2026 World Cup is the largest in the tournament’s history – expanded to 48 teams and spread across three countries: the United States, Canada, and Mexico. With matches hosted in 16 cities across North America, the scale of both opportunity and risk is unprecedented.

The US leg alone includes major cities like Los Angeles, New York, Dallas, Miami, Seattle, and, crucially for our work, Philadelphia. The influx of individuals across a breadth of locations means traffickers have ample opportunity to exploit individuals and turn over a high profit. Given the scale of the tournament, it is likely that it will be the most attractive trafficking and exploitation market linked to a major event in modern history.

A close look: What we're doing in Philadelphia

With Philadelphia hosting several major events, including the 2026 FIFA World Cup, STOP THE TRAFFIK, working with ChatterBlast Media and The Salvation Army Greater Philadelphia, is introducing its unique prevention model to the city.

We are bringing a public awareness campaign to the city of Philadelphia that holds two key purposes: prevention and awareness. The campaign will reduce vulnerability before exploitation occurs, ensure clear pathways to support, and increase city-wide understanding of trafficking risks. Through multi-sector collaborative discussions, a prevention-oriented public safety campaign, and expert intelligence through the world’s richest human trafficking database, STOP THE TRAFFIK is supporting Philadelphia to adequately prepare for the trafficking and exploitation risks that coincide with major sporting events.

Philadelphia’s role as a World Cup host city makes it both a target and an opportunity. While our broader World Cup strategy focuses on national-level awareness, intelligence, and industry engagement, our Philadelphia work goes deeper, building local infrastructure that will allow the city to shape a legacy of safety, proactive crime prevention, and innovative, replicable solutions. STOP THE TRAFFIK will harness data analysis, survivor-centred messaging guidance, and training content development, while ChatterBlast translates these insights into locally resonant media and localise and support training delivery, together providing on-the-ground support for Philadelphia’s community.

Our approach in Philadelphia: Prevention, intelligence, and partnership

STOP THE TRAFFIK’s World Cup preparation operates across three pillars:

1. Intelligence and early warning: Our Intelligence Network allows us to gather and analyse signals of exploitation before and during the event. By identifying patterns early, we can alert partners and disrupt trafficking operations before harm occurs.
2. Industry training and engagement: We’re working directly with the hospitality sector – hotels, venues, transport – to equip frontline staff with the knowledge and confidence to identify and report suspected exploitation. Staff who know what to look for are one of our most powerful tools.
3. Community awareness: We cannot stop trafficking alone. It takes people on the ground, technology in the hands of communities, and sustained investment in the intelligence infrastructure that enables prevention. Download our STOP APP to report instances of trafficking, share our campaigns on your social media, or donate. Together, we can create a world where no one is bought or sold.

Download The STOP APP

The STOP APP allows anyone who has experienced exploitation or witnessed suspicious activity to safely and anonymously report it.

Reports are not recorded or stored on your phone. Please make sure you are in a safe location, away from the suspected incident, before submitting a report.

Upon the conclusion of the tournament, we will share our World Cup findings, synthesising our insights not only for public awareness but also to further inform our strategy for major sporting events in the future.

We expect the 2026 World Cup to be a significant hub for trafficking operations. But we also expect it to be a moment of possibility. STOP THE TRAFFIK is utilising our unique prevention approach to ensure cities across North America are equipped with the necessary knowledge to prepare for trafficking risks and ultimately, get ahead of the game.