Yes he was accused and then acquitted. That doesn't change the definition of "criminals". The surveillance state may change the likelihood of a miscarriage of j

Yes he was accused and then acquitted. That doesn't change the definition of "criminals". The surveillance state may change the likelihood of a miscarriage of justice. But in my view, the much more important problem is that the surveillance state makes people afraid of getting wrongly accused of a crime. They stop doing perfectly legal things because they might be difficult to explain. I have observed that in my own behavior and I know others who have become very defensive in their use of the internet.