I wish it were true, but in practice it turns out quite the opposite. With enough surveillance you can turn anybody into a criminal. I'm reminded of a quote that's also mentioned in this[0] article:
> Alan Dershowitz discusses his time litigating cases in the old Soviet Union. He was always taken by the fact that they could prosecute anybody they wanted because some of the statutes were so vague. Dershowitz points out that this was a technique developed by Beria, the infamous sidekick of Stalin, who said, “Show me the man and I’ll find you the crime.”
With vague laws and arbitrary enforcement it's very easy to produce a society that lives in fear.
> Alan Dershowitz discusses his time litigating cases in the old Soviet Union. He was always taken by the fact that they could prosecute anybody they wanted because some of the statutes were so vague. Dershowitz points out that this was a technique developed by Beria, the infamous sidekick of Stalin, who said, “Show me the man and I’ll find you the crime.”
With vague laws and arbitrary enforcement it's very easy to produce a society that lives in fear.
[0] "The Criminalization of Almost Everything" http://www.cato.org/policy-report/januaryfebruary-2010/crimi...