So, something has been on my mind for a while and I haven't personally seen any discussion of it here before.
So blackmail is the weapon of choice to control powerful people. If you just sat back and passively collect whatever dark secrets you can, is that ever going to be enough to actually control a society? So you can tempt people, which I think is well established already via Epstein and others like him. But even then those with strong character can overcome temptation. What if you invert moralities, to make what would otherwise be perfectly ordinary a social taboo, so that even if one should avoid incriminating oneself it is only through denying themselves, which is likely to cause all manner of aberrant behaviour (I'm thinking of priests who deny the flesh, but it likely extends elsewhere). Then of course you have the digital age and the rapidly advancing ability to outright fabricate blackmail material, though I would imagine this is less effective as a soft control tool if the subject themselves feels no guilt.
Ultimately I think this is something we will have to face sooner or later, and it deserves some deeper consideration and discussion.