Yes, tools are just tools - they are not good or bad by themselves but by how people use them. (Though of course, some tools are much easier to use for one side than the other.)

The second issue is surveillance does not affect all crime[0] equally. It works best against organized or planned action. It does little to prevent crimes of passion or spur of the moment decisions. States are more likely to be affected of the first kind, normal people are much more likely to be affected by the second.

[0]: It should go without saying, crime does not mean bad/harmful/evil but merely against the law. Slavery used to be legal, as was the holocaust.