Brian - How far should a state have a right to monitor the actions of people within its borders?

The government should not have too much authority to monitor the actions of its people if it causes social unrest as people do not feel secure as their privacy is being invaded by state officials. Even though I agree that the government should be concerned about the welfare of its people, they should not have the right to check up and spy upon the people as and when they like. People should be given their own privacy as long as they do not threaten the security of the nation. For example, in USA, the government is able to tap into peoples’ telephone lines without the consent of the people involved. They claimed that they were trying to locate and stop possible terrorist attacks from happening. This has caused much disturbance in the people of USA as they feel that they are being watched upon by the government every second of their lives and do not feel that they have any privacy at all. However, I feel that the government still has to have some sort of control over what happens in their nation to be able to govern the nation properly. With zero monitoring of the peoples’ actions, people could be involved in illegal activities without being afraid of getting caught. For example, some nations’ police force uses phone tapping to track down criminals by tapping into their conversations and hunt them down. Hence the government should monitor the actions of people within its borders if problems escalate to a national level and rupture the stability of society.