People are less likely to look up, or say, things in private that can get retroactively interpreted in the worst possible way by state actors who are looking for an easy arrest and/or conviction.
In the past, it was nearly impossible to round up everyone based on what they looked up in an encyclopedia, or on a map, in private. Your pursuit of knowledge wasn't limited by the very real threat of "Can just having curiosity about something land me in prison for terrorism/murder/arson/etc?"
It borders on thoughtcrime and feels like a fishing expedition to me.
> After a house is burned down, they are likely to ask everyone around if they saw or heard anything
To continue this analogy, simply asking is different than getting a warrant/subpoena for everyone in a neighborhood to search through records of their past speech to see if they said anything they deem suspicious.