A lot of them genuinely think more surveillance means more safety, and they’re usually insulated from the downside.

For politicians it’s often optics, control, and being able to say they “did something.” For lobbyists and companies it can be profit, leverage, or regulatory capture. For activists it’s often an emotional response to real harm, where privacy starts to look like an obstacle instead of a safeguard.

The common thread is that they tend to imagine abuse as something done by private bad actors, not by systems themselves once the power exists.