Agreed but what's happening is that governments are waking to the idea that not only will communications over the wire be encrypted from platforms (such as sign

Agreed but what's happening is that governments are waking to the idea that not only will communications over the wire be encrypted from platforms (such as signal, dare I say whatsa--- no I can't, but you get the point), data at rest will similarly be out of reach from platforms with technologies like zero knowledge proofs and homomorphic encryption. There will come a day, baring any tampering/legal obstacles where most companies simply won't be able to see the underlying data unless the user grants permission for the use. Even then users may not even need to grant permission to the entire object but elements of the object to facilitate an answer -- i.e. instead of granting access to an entire social security number, the system could simply ask via algorithm , do you have a valid social security number and is it yours and the answer comes back yes/no. To be quite honest, I don't see why governments couldn't join such a system but I guess if given a preference, they'd prefer to coerce the platforms rather than ask the users each and every time...just because that's the easy way doesn't mean it's the right way.