Introduction: this article focuses on the practices of surveillance and monitoring of personal information carried out by the two main world economic powers (United States and China), at two critical moments in recent history: the attack on the World Trade Center towers, on September 11, 2001, and the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic in 2020. Objective: demonstrate that, in such periods, personal information surveillance actions tend to be reinforced by governments, from different cultural?backgrounds, without facing great resistance from the populations that are frightened by the prospect of death. Methodology: the research is based on two case studies to verify possible similarities between the US state surveillance actions, carried out after September 11, 2001, and the state surveillance actions carried out by China during the COVID-19 pandemic. Results: it is possible to affirm that, although the motivations declared are different (referring to national security, in 2001, and public health, in 2020), both phenomena (terrorist action and pandemic) serve as a justification for the increase in surveillance actions in the aforementioned world powers, which use public fear to increase control over their citizens. Conclusions: State surveillance, whether in socalled democratic or authoritarian countries, operates from a dialectical perspective of protection and control, being necessary to establish limits to the use of personal data by governments and the defense of the privacy of individuals.
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