>>In former times there was no technology to spy on a sizeable percentage of all communication. That balance has shifted and needs to be counterbalanced by encryption IMO
>
>Actually, it was easier then to monitor communications then, since just about everything that wasn't spoken went via US Mail or Telegraph.
>Every phone call went through a switchboard which allowed anyone who wanted to to listen in
>My wife (then my girlfriend) told me that some of the letters I sent from overseas had been opened and read by a censor.
>That poor censor must have been bored to death.

But since there was no machinery involved, available work force limited the amount of spying and no copies were created unless there was suspicion.
The amount of automation available today to the spying side(s) is different from back then