The numbers have changed. When I consider what the executive protection landscape across Canada looked like five years ago compared to today, the gap is significant — not just in how many clients are calling, but in the nature of the threats they are facing and the degree to which companies are finally taking personal security seriously.
This shift is not driven by fear. It is driven by data.
The global executive protection market was valued at USD 17.22 billion in 2025, and it is projected to reach USD 29.73 billion by 2032 — growing at a compound annual rate of 8.1%, according to Verified Market Research. That growth is not incidental. It reflects a measurable shift in the threat environment that executives operate within, and a corporate sector that is, finally, responding accordingly.
In Canada, the security services industry sits at $8.3 billion in 2025, according to IBISWorld. But the real story is not the dollar figure — it is what is driving the demand.
The Threat Environment Has Shifted
In 2024, ASIS International documented 462 security incidents involving high-profile individuals — an average of 39 incidents per month. Physical threats — assaults, kidnapping, stalking, and targeted protest actions — accounted for 85% of those incidents. Thirty-three percent resulted in death or physical injury.
Between June and December of 2024 alone, more than 1,560 direct threats were identified against CEOs. By the first ten months of 2025, documented incident counts had already reached 95 cases — a sharp acceleration from prior years, as tracked in ASIS International’s 2025 Executive Protection Benchmarking Research.
The assassination of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in December 2024 marked a turning point in how both corporations and individuals understand executive risk. In the months that followed, Fortune 500 companies increased security budgets by an average of 25%. According to the Harvard Corporate Governance Forum, median spending on executive security grew 118.9% between 2021 and 2024 — from roughly $43,000 to $94,000 annually.
Canada is not immune to these dynamics. The resource sector, financial services, and technology firms operating across Alberta, British Columbia, and Ontario face the same elevated threat environment. And the executives leading those organizations need to understand that the question is no longer whether to have protection — it is whether the protection they have is actually built to handle the threats that now exist.
A Single Layer Is Not a System
When people think of executive protection, they tend to imagine one thing: a trained individual who stays close. That image is incomplete. And when threat environments are this dynamic, incomplete is the same as inadequate.
Real protection is a system. What I have built at Cornerstone Security is a multi-layered approach — four distinct disciplines that work in concert, because no single capability on its own is sufficient.
Close Protection
Close protection is the visible layer. It involves a trained agent positioned in proximity to the client — present during high-exposure events, at-risk travel, and any environment where the threat level warrants a physical protective presence. But close protection alone is reactive by nature. It responds to threats that have already materialized. The layers beneath it are what prevent threats from ever reaching that point.
Secured Driving Services
Movement is one of the highest-risk periods in any executive’s day. Fixed routes, predictable timing, and unfamiliar environments create exactly the kind of pattern that threat actors look for. Our secured driving service places trained security drivers behind the wheel — individuals who understand defensive and evasive driving, who know the geography of the cities they operate in, and who maintain situational awareness that a standard executive driver simply is not trained to provide. Whether the movement is between a downtown Calgary boardroom and the international airport, or across the QE2 corridor, the vehicle is not just transportation — it is part of the protective envelope.
Residential Security
The home is the environment where most executives lower their guard. Schedules become predictable. Household routines are visible. Families are present. Residential security involves assessing and hardening that environment — reviewing access points, evaluating surveillance coverage, and understanding who has access and how that access is managed. In cases where the threat level is elevated, we can deploy a residential agent. In others, a thorough assessment and a targeted set of operational changes make a decisive difference.
Advance Work
Advance is the layer that most people outside the industry never see — and the one that makes everything else more effective. Before a principal walks into a venue, a meeting room, a hotel, or a restaurant, our team has already been there. We survey access and egress points, identify risk factors, confirm the environment, and brief the close protection team accordingly. When advance is done properly, the protection detail arrives informed. When it is absent, the detail improvises — and improvisation is where gaps appear.
The Full Concierge Experience
The layered approach is necessary. But it is the operational philosophy behind it that sets Cornerstone apart — particularly in a market like Vancouver, where the standard for client experience has not kept pace with what a high-functioning protection operation can actually deliver.
What we have built is what I call a full concierge experience. It is the integration of protection into a client’s life in a way that removes friction rather than adding it.
Arrivals and departures are managed so that the client never stands waiting. Venues are pre-cleared. Restaurants are notified. Hotel suites are inspected before check-in. When a client’s schedule changes, we adapt without disruption. When a new destination is added, we advance it. The intelligence picture — who is in the area, what the risk environment looks like, whether a pattern has developed — is maintained continuously, not consulted after the fact.
This level of operational integration is standard practice in high-end protection environments internationally. In Vancouver, and more broadly across Canada, it remains rare. Most firms offer the guard. Few offer the system. And almost none offer the experience — the sense that protection is enhancing the client’s ability to operate rather than burdening it.
The executives, entertainers, and high-net-worth families who work with Cornerstone do not feel managed. They feel covered. That distinction is deliberate, and it is what every aspect of the Cornerstone operation is designed to produce. You can read more about this approach in our post on executive protection and the full concierge experience in Vancouver.
Why This Matters for Canadian Executives
Canada’s threat environment is real, and it is specific. Corporate espionage has grown considerably — FBI data shows a 1,300% increase in trade secret theft cases over the past decade, with 60% of incidents involving a current or former employee, according to Solace Global’s Corporate Espionage Report. Technology and resource sector firms operating across British Columbia and Alberta are primary targets. Executives in those sectors carry information, make decisions, and represent assets that create quantifiable risk.
Drawing from the 2025 ASIS International and Everbridge survey of 824 security professionals, 42% report that executive protection is receiving significantly more organizational emphasis than it did two years ago. Despite that trend, only 28% of organizations currently have a formal EP policy with dedicated resources in place. That gap represents an exposure that, in an elevated threat environment, carries real consequences.
In addition to this, non-CEO leadership targeting has increased 225% since 2023. This is no longer a concern reserved for the most prominent executives. It is a concern for anyone who leads at a visible level, manages significant assets, or operates in an industry that draws public attention.
The question I am asked most often is some version of: do I actually need this? The honest answer is that by the time someone is asking the question, the answer is usually yes. Threat environments do not announce themselves. They develop over time, often quietly, and the window to act intelligently is always wider before an incident than after one.
What I can offer is a genuine assessment — a conversation about the actual environment, the specific vulnerabilities, and what level of protection is appropriate. Not the maximum. The right one.
Cornerstone Security: Executive Protection Across Canada
Cornerstone Security provides executive protection and personal security services across Canada — with operations in Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, Red Deer, and Fort McMurray. We are BBB A+ rated, ASIS International members, and CATAP certified. Every agent we deploy is licensed, vetted, and trained to operate across corporate, residential, and travel environments.
Our approach integrates close protection, secured driving, residential security, and advance work into a single, coherent protective system — delivered with the operational discipline and client experience that the concierge model demands.
If you are considering executive protection in Canada, I would welcome the conversation. Contact us to schedule a confidential consultation.
— Justice Osei, Founder, Cornerstone Security
