Some of the cameras near me are clearly pointed at scenery. I won't presume anything about why they are pointed at scenery and insecure; but I also won't presume that they are intended to remain private.
Still, I'm surprised they pretty much all have such miserable quality.
I used to have one overlooking the river in my mother's house. I spent a lot of time tuning it so it looked really great, both day and night (at night using really long exposure times). I used high quality webcams at first and then the 5MP raspberry cam (later modded with a better lens).
But even the "1080p" security cams that cost $200 or more have horrible quality compared to those. They're good for security purposes yes, but I wouldn't use them to advertise the views from a hotel.
I really wish there were some really HQ webcams around the world, think 4K or even 8K (so you could zoom in even on a 4K screen), with good night performance, it would be so great to really get a feel for a city. These cams are just so poor.