I recall the immigration/security process taking a long time at YVR, so be sure & allow plenty of time. Instead of the TA taking checked bags at check-in, we had to take them to another area & put them on a belt, and as we did so they were photographed, which we didn't notice at the time. At a later checkpoint we were asked how many bags we had checked, which the agent cross-checked on his computer w photos of our bags being placed on the belt. I had never seen that & thought it was pretty cool.

They also went through all carry-on bags by hand, thoroughly, after they cleared the x-ray machines, so the lines moved quite slowly. I lost a toothbrush in the process after the agent pawed all over it with her gloved hand that had pawed all over everybody else's stuff. I told her, you can just throw that away, thanks (she did). We traveled there just before the 2010 Winter Olympics, the agent told me the extra security measures were due to the games (even though we were leaving YVR). Not sure if our experience was typical or was, in fact, event-specific.