The difference is that previously you had to be targeted and intercepted. Thinking that someone is listening was something that paranoid people would do.
Now your device is actually watching you and reporting you. Today only for child porn but there’s no technical reason of it not being extended to anything.
> The difference is that previously you had to be targeted and intercepted
This is also true, to some degree. I believe all calls to the USSR were monitored, for instance. But the dragnet is thrown much further these days.
In fairness, in the "old way" it was impossible for two random people to communicate in real-time between continents without the ability of authorities to observe/break it.
Privacy and security is quite important, but let's not lose track of the fact that there are many tools authorities have lost in the past few decades. In WWII major powers weren't able to have the same security of military communications as an idiot can today. And that's relative to codebreaking technology.
If I had a good solution, I'd tell you.