Is it the media creating all this paranoia or is it a natural human trait. My address is public, my phone number is public, the state and feds have my picture on drivers license and passports. I’m not overly worried that the serial number of a fire arm is visible in a photo on a forum. All my firearms are all legal and the number are recorded somewhere any way.
There are a lot of people out there that think the way that you do just as a lot of folks describe folks that worry about their personal safety as "paranoid" because their experiences and expectations do not "jive" with what others see.
Because of my job, I deal with researching situations including some very disturbing ones where the tools of surveillance have been used by individuals, companies, and governments for very bad things. Coupled with computer databases, it makes it easy to tie information together with a bow in seconds that would have either been impossible in the past or extremely difficult or expensive.
Why should people collaborate with such evil? Secret police chief Lavrenty Beria of the NKVD and Stalin era fame boasted, "Show me the man, and I’ll show you the crime." Computer databases make that easy and convenient.
https://www.cato.org/policy-report/januaryfebruary-2010/criminalization-almost-everything
My wife liked watching "Househunters Intl" and one time they had an apartment building built in East Berlin during the Cold War. Every apartment was wired for sound and cameras were installed which were discovered when they renovated the building for new apartments. At the time, estimates are that the Stasi had between 1 and 7 and 1 and 10 E. Germans working as either full time Stasi employees or as part time informers.
https://infogalactic.com/info/Stasi Despite all of that, they had to tediously listen in real time to conversations, tapes, etc. and Stasi people get bored, disinterested, shirk, etc. Dossiers were on paper and the compilations for an enemy of state took a lot of time, money, etc. and thus authorities were concentrated due to human frailty on relatively few "dissidents" while the omnipresent spying was done to impress the population not to become a dissident. For reasons of state, the E. Germans would pick out someone just to make a point and crush them as a warning to others on relatively minor offenses (buying black market jeans for example) But, people must sleep, even Stasi agents, people get bored, people have feelings such as sympathy, people can be corrupted through bribes, people get stuff confused, etc. A human tyrant will eventually succumb to data overload and human foibles. Not so computer networks as they never sleep, never forget, never get lazy, and make the perfect complement to the ultimate in a modern tyranny. The most appalling thing is that the "machine" gets people to willingly give up their information for free (or for minor conveniences such as ordering toilet paper via Alexa instead of going to the store) that the companies and government can then exploit which they could not get otherwise.
Imagine how efficient the Stasi would be now--a cashless society means that every transaction could be tracked, your Alexa/Fire/Cell Phone could be turned on and off for audio surveillance, the geo locator on your phone and/or car would indicate where you were at any time within a matter of a few feet, your social media accounts, magazine subscriptions, what books and magazines you read, when you are up and when you sleep, what tv programs that you like, and personal texts/emails/likes, etc can be examined for "bad thoughts" AND the whole process can be automated with the information gathered by a few key strokes. For the most part, the individual agent only has to type in search terms to access information that would have taken weeks or even months to accumulate before. What is worse, is that companies are also in on the grift--the government looks the other way while companies accumulate their dossiers and sell the information for fun and profit but promptly cooperate with governments across the globe so as to have access to that country's market.
Everyone that filled out the SF-86 for decades numbering millions which is required for security clearances had their data handed off to the Chinese via hacking. This also means that government already had this information in a compact database ready for easy searching already. In that document, people were required by law to answer extremely embarrassing questions regarding finances, relationships, past problems with the law, etc. Paper records of millions of people could have never been compromised that readily as a Ryder rental truck showing up to load thousands of boxes of records would be rather obvious and easy to stop before it made it to China.
Computers with data collection have made it possible for the first time to have an entire population monitored in real time and algorithms enable the Chinese for example to have something like a "social credit system" which effectively is like a credit score--if the government/corporations determine that you own a firearm then you might lose jobs, or be forbidden/pay higher prices for financial products such as insurance, lose access to credit as you might spend it on "bad things", and even travel as the Chinese use internal passports.
https://www.businessinsider.com/china-social-credit-system-punishments-and-rewards-explained-2018-4/
As a brief example,
For example, right now, if you have a modern car, it has a black box that indicates speed, acceleration, brakes, audio, seat belt etc.
https://www.legalmatch.com/law-library/article/automobile-black-box-laws.html
That information in many states is determined not to belong with you and thus can be shared with police, insurance companies, etc. Did you speed through the intersection? etc. Your devices that you "own" can effectively testify to your detriment in both civil and criminal actions rendering the 5th Amendment protections archaic.
By the way, folks might want to read Three Felonies a Day by Harvey Silvergate or simply do an internet search (using Duck Duck Go for example) on that because even just the federal system is replete with crimes that you may have committed--for example transferring a movie on VHS to digital or copying/download songs, videos, etc. or violated the terms of agreement on a website--the boring stuff you scroll past to give agreement to.
https://www.maxim.com/not_migrating/7-felonies-youve-probably-committed-your-lifetime