That’s in a lot of way a reversal. The default state of thing before World War II was very little data collection and even less aggregation.

Everything pretty much started in the 30s with data processing mechanisation and World War II didn’t end with more protection. It ended with states having the tools to collect and feeling ready to use them with things like the generalisation of passports, social security numbers becoming standard.

It has actually pretty much gone down hill from there since. I think people overestimate what’s appropriate to collect and misunderstand how things used to work which is why they tolerate so much monitoring.