Data-sharing between government agencies is one of DOGE’s key objectives. And in many ways, updating the handling and distribution of federal data is a noble endeavor. Much of the U.S. government runs on outdated legacy technologies, and (according to a 2023 brief from the American Economic Association) government data “could serve policymakers and the public better if not for … agencies’ uneven access to key source data.”

But data sharing is also a potent weapon—or, rather, a key tactic in the weaponization of bureaucratic agencies as ideological enforcers. The biggest threats to privacy in the twenty-first century often do not come from the collection of any specific piece of information; they come from data linking. Information that was collected for a particular purpose by one organization can be used for a very different purpose by another organization, especially when it is merged with other data into a detailed personal profile. Individuals end up, in effect, with a digital twin, assembled from the informational footprints they leave behind.