The foundation of an economy is not money, or economic power, or resources.  It is trust.  (I have written about this here and here)

This article from MoneyNews does a fine job of laying out the problem, which is the loss of trust from our snooping.

The world is a dangerous place.  Our forebears paid a heavy price for our freedom, and if we are to keep it, we will have to pay unknown costs in the future.  A loss of commercial trust would be devastating to our economic future, but would only be a reminder of the bad trade of freedom for illusory “security”.

Franklin had it right.  He said that people willing to trade their freedom for temporary security deserve neither and will lose both. (exact quote unclear: see here)