Oh, yeah, it absolutely does belong here. And the “reasons” we absolutely need this or that new incursion on our privacy are always something that ends up being inflated to cartoonish proportions, while everyone else is supposed to feel reassured.

Lol, no. What surveillance ends up being used for primarily – not even as an exception but as its primary goal – is backwards criminalization, where a person or organization in power has someone in front of them now that they wish to see rendered powerless, or disregarded, or silenced, so they just go back through the data looking for the points where that troublesome person stepped over some invisible line, charge them retroactively for their “crime”, and are done with them.

Even in the example of the article, surveillance doesn’t prevent anything. It only ever looks back. In a world (especially in the UK) where cameras already abound but crime rates stay the same or go higher, and regular police forces that supposedly exist to serve the community remain strapped, understaffed and underfunded, it is unrealistic to believe there will be some magical space where this collected surveillance data is processed, rings some alarm as designed, and the good guys come pouring out of a nearby substation to save the damsel in distress.

And we know this because there are already countless criminal alarms, and data, and specific cries for help that get ignored as a matter of routine. This new alarm will simply be added to the pile of those already ignored, while the people in power – who really want to just pre-emptively collect surveillance data on a supposedly free society – use it at-will and unseen to create and keep their own power by any means possible.