If this passes you can be sure anything digital is no longer safe from alphabet agencies. Sadly the younger generation has no concern for privacy and the older generation likely has no clue their data is being siphoned. Advocates are too much of a minority to make a difference.
The main issue with something like this though isn’t really about the rest of the world catching up to the US technologically. It’s a question of whether service providers would choose not operating in the US over following their rules. But given the size of the US market, you’d find a lot of service providers choosing to follow the rules.
Which is incidentally the same way EU nations enforce their laws on companies like Google. And how countries like France, Germany and UK would enforce the anti-encryption laws they’ve been trying for years to get on the books.
Yes, I'm aware of some of the issues surrounding IP copying. I won't call it theft because the word is contentious and there are those in this forum who don't think you can steal ideas.
I'm also aware of the US' own history of gathering IP to bootstrap its industrial efforts. I guess that "but you did it first" isn't a good defence in law (not really sure of that, after all IANAL) but it makes the US case weaker in my eyes.
Do you think that's related to China allowing zero domestic tech competition, but demanding that their companies be allowed to compete in the rest of the world?