[exporectomy]

Hackers on the internet are lawless because they're in Russia or wherever, but somebody looking through your walls with wifi will be personally present in your street where he's at risk of being caught so it's a completely different kind of risk.

[world_peace42]

Totally agree about peeping toms. But, if a company gets to spy on you via their devices with impunity, your politicians representing you get pay bumps.

[suifbwish]

You sound as if you aren’t aware of wifi beam antennas that can connect from about a mile away, or aware that drones can be equipped with multi-array wifi antennas.

[exporectomy]

I guess I used too extreme an example so you misunderstood. The distinction I'm making is that those things you mentioned put the person doing them at risk of arrest because they must be physically present while hacking from Russia doesn't.

Cellphone jammers are probably a clearer example of cheap tech that can be used covertly but it's illegal and people usually don't.

Another important factor is that they aren't scalable because it takes a human a lot of work to hack only extremely local targets, not a program that can scan computers all over the world automatically.