No, it's not, as in Europe there are privacy laws protecting citizens from being surveilled. Now, these apply to both the government and companies, but slowly

No, it's not, as in Europe there are privacy laws protecting citizens from being surveilled. Now, these apply to both the government and companies, but slowly more and more carveouts are created to allow governmental entities to violate your privacy. For example, when I lived in Belgium, there was a debate around installing ALPR cameras on the E314 (major freeway). How long was the data stored? Who has access to it? Do you need a warrant? (And then later on it was discovered that data wasn't really purged...) This is completely different to ALPR cameras in the USA. Here a private company can start to drive around with ALPR cameras mounted on a car, and start to build a database. Flock has cameras on a LOT of intersections and HOAs. And Flock sells this service to law enforcement, who don't need a warrant to search this database (unlike them setting up a camera or putting a tracker on someone's vehicle).