I don’t think the websites all started thinking “I’ll harvest data for the inevitable surveillance state”
Google actually started with great intentions and hoped to translate the data into revenue via “normal” ads
But… Dogy ass holes paid better than ads, and, like most companies, whenever they get successful/big enough, everything goes out the window in favour of profits


Yeah exactly. Ultimately they became money machines, and they only exist to make more money now… Some will have willfully amoral motivations (Cambridge analytica, palantir) and others will just persue more money, regardless of the outcome of his they do it, I.E implicily amoral.