Government Surveillance Debate

This cluster centers on concerns about mass surveillance by governments, especially in the US and UK, including references to state programs, privacy rights, the 'nothing to hide' argument, and criticisms of expanding surveillance powers.

➡️ Stable 0.7x Politics & Society
5,365
Comments
19
Years Active
5
Top Authors
#6614
Topic ID

Activity Over Time

2008
3
2009
8
2010
13
2011
28
2012
73
2013
858
2014
417
2015
477
2016
421
2017
280
2018
276
2019
366
2020
376
2021
405
2022
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2023
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2024
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2025
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2026
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Keywords

welivesecurity.com US HN CCTV WW2 USSR wikipedia.org UK YouTube harvardmagazine.com surveillance government state leader mass rights speech anonymity citizens foundations

Sample Comments

lm28469 Sep 20, 2022 View on HN

You might be interested in: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance_in_the_Unite...

wahnfrieden Aug 22, 2022 View on HN

you can go learn about state surveillance more generally to answer that instead of handwaving it away as 'seems worth it to me'

farmerstan Aug 13, 2021 View on HN

It’s eye opening how naive some people on HN are despite decades of evidence that things are always twisted in favor of more government surveillance especially outside of the US.

belter Mar 24, 2022 View on HN

The state monitors you actively not just passively:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance_in_the_Unite...

ubernostrum Dec 7, 2016 View on HN

Surveillance is a political topic. Get it off HN.

ataur Mar 7, 2017 View on HN

Makes me think of this article about the American surveillance state http://harvardmagazine.com/2017/01/the-watchers

momirlan Feb 8, 2023 View on HN

according to this logic, total video surveillance is ok too, because it's just a tool. the government scanning all your private conversations is ok too, as long as the government is good.but all these could be used by a government to influence the voter behaviour such that they stay in power forever, China style.you are ready for communism.

beeflet Nov 1, 2025 View on HN

the USA has achieved communist levels of surveillance

shapefrog Nov 18, 2022 View on HN

Nahh US surveillance is the good kind /s

xyzzy123 Oct 8, 2015 View on HN

You're making the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing_to_hide_argument except for corporate surveillance instead of state surveillance.