It's really a tiny little world now-a-days. IoT devices, or a new virus.... we are all connected... like it or not.
The American Government (primary the NSA) began the spying via data collection on average people many years ago. Although spying on individuals has and
will always remain popular with governments. The idea of cracking the "human code" was the idea that lead to the tracking and recording of every phone in North America.
The idea is similar to the way native Americans learned to harvest buffaloes.
Learn the heard mentally. Once you know how to cause a stampede... on demand....and you know the lay of the land. A small hunting party can then cause a herd to stampede in a direction that pushes large numbers of protein and hide laden critters off a cliff. Prosperity at no risk... and little effort.
The idea is that humans are just simple and predictive enough that they can be controlled with proper data collection and utilization. It's every politicians dream.
The rumor is that this advanced technology was put to use in the 2016 presidential election..... making Hillary Clinton the first female American President.
IoT devices do
NOT in anyway make us safer. And Pandemics do
NOT make us healthier. But I am not sure either will cause any of us any immediate harm.