The title does not do the content justice. Since Snowden it's been known to the entire world, even outside of HN, that the US government has had this capability for decades now, with mass dragnet surveillance of all internet traffic.
What has changed is that now they're actually using this to a degree that even China generally does not do. If a German had written a comment in support of the Hong Kong protests on Facebook at some point in time, they're extremely unlikely to get denied entry to China over this, despite them almost certainly having even stronger capabilities and databases to easily find this out.
What has changed is that now they're actually using this to a degree that even China generally does not do. If a German had written a comment in support of the Hong Kong protests on Facebook at some point in time, they're extremely unlikely to get denied entry to China over this, despite them almost certainly having even stronger capabilities and databases to easily find this out.