>Failure to respect privacy lends itself to authoritarianism as people will self-censor if they feel they are not able to express themselves. Maybe I'm overstating this but it's a real concern of mine.

Likely not overstating it because this is exactly what has happened both historically and currently in some countries.

The need for privacy is proven, not because people need to hide criminal behaviour or menial things, but because we can't rely on people with power to always do the right thing.