> The worst thing a corporation is likely to do (other than giving your data to governments) is to sell you something. That's all they want. They collect data so they can make money off you. That's not so scary to me. Governments want to put you in jail (or freeze your bank account, etc) if you get out of line.
It depends what government and what corporations. If it's a healthy functionally representative government then it's rules and laws can be to a certain extent controlled by the public. It may be harder to influence corporations. If a bank wants to close your account, or Visa stops accepting your payments or airlines don't let you fly, you can't complain, they'll just "well tough luck, it's our bank, our airplanes, our payment system, go create your own if you disagree". So I agree with you that this should be a worrying thing for the U.K. citizens, they should ask their government why the heck does it want all that data and maybe it should stop.
> Yes, corporations and the government are often in cahoots here - but even then we should be talking about how wrong it is for governments to be buying/taking/demanding data from corporations - keeping the focus squarely on the government.
Very much in cahoots. They hide behind each others backs, too. "(Apple): Sorry, government made us do it, our hands are tied". "(Govt): Sorry, _we_ are not spying on you. We just bought some data from Google or Apple".