For the FIFA Confederations Cup, Brazil put 54,000 security officers on the streets, worked out of coordinated command centers in all host cities for the soccer tournament, and invested in technology, such as bomb-defusing robots.

More than 1,100 military personnel with expertise in fighting terrorism and combating chemical and nuclear agents were deployed.

But one contingency that officials apparently didn’t plan for was 1 million Brazilians taking to the streets for massive protests during the two weeks Brazil has played host to the tournament.

The protests add a whole new dimension to security threats, said Frank Holder, chairman for Latin America of FTI Consulting, a global advisory firm. “No one I’ve talked to thought of this as a potential scenario from a security point of view,’’ he said.

The soccer tournament ends Sunday, but the demonstrations — they began as a protest against an increase in bus fares and then morphed into generalized discontent about the money being spent on building and renovating soccer stadiums in the face of corruption, poor healthcare and a mediocre public education system — are expected to continue. Thousands fought with police Thursday outside the stadium where a Confederations Cup semi-final match was taking place.

The tournament was supposed to be Brazil’s dress rehearsal for the 2014 World Cup, which will be held next June 12-July 13, and an opportunity to see if its security systems, airports, stadiums and transit systems performed up to snuff. Fears about six new stadiums not being quite ready for prime time didn’t materialize and FIFA officials said they were satisfied with the arenas.

But now Brazil must go back to the drawing board and formulate new security plans that factor in massive, possibly violent, public protests. So far, the protests have been mostly peaceful, but about a half-dozen people have died, police have unleashed rubber bullets, tear gas and pepper spray on crowds, some stores have been looted and windows at government ministries have been shattered.

“The Confederations Cup is a good sample of what could happen during the World Cup,’’ Holder said.

Meeting the security demands of the World Cup, however, will be far more difficult because it will be played in 12 cities.

If massive protests crop up during the World Cup, “will there be enough trained people to cover so many venues when there are also other types of security threats to address?” asked Holder.

Even before the protests, FTI had given Brazil a 4 on a five-point Latin American Public Security Index with 5 being the most dangerous. The 4 put Brazil on par with Bolivia, Colombia and El Salvador and reflected higher rates of violent crime — especially in the Northeast, a rise in homicides in Sao Paulo as police and local gangs clashed and an increase in loss or theft of merchandise, Holder said.

President Dilma Rousseff has promised to address the concerns of protestors and has already met with some of them. But Holder said, “Dilma will have to do something significant to back up her words.”

At this point, getting from protest mode to concrete solutions will be “very hard,’’ said Armando Castelar Pinheiro, an economist with the Getulio Vargas Foundation in Rio de Janeiro. “People are protesting mostly because they are fed up rather than because they see a clear way out.”