Well, that's how it tends to be in most places.
You don't get caught for downloading; you get caught for uploading.
Using a similar logic to distribution via DVDs. Only the seller gets into trouble. The buyer does not.
Another point, opening a web page means downloading it, so if someone wanted to frame someone for downloading something, it would be very easy to make such a trap. This, accompanied with CSAM and network monitoring could be used to easily get any person using the internet, in jail, just for opening the wrong link. So, the laws require much more information regarding intent and such.
In Portugal, for example, it's legal to download pirated content. It's not a matter of not pursuing it because it's hard or being difficult to catch or distributors are an easier target, it's just that, legally, you're not doing anything wrong.
Is it not also because it was easier to feign ignorance for the time the laws were passed?
And that nobody thought of Tor, while at the same time, leechers who don't seed are actually being worse for the Torrent?
Eh. Makes sense from the perspective of protecting profits, I guess, because the actual thing which bothers them is the volume of lost potential customers....