Having worked in intelligence against the Russians, they know that they are outclassed economically and world wide, out gunned as well. They posture, they take limited opportunities of tactical value like the Crimea and selling arms/cozying up to Syria and Turkey as a way to thumb their noses at us but they realize none of this. end of the day, will win them anything big. But for Putin to somewhat impress his power base and keep power its enough. Similar for Kim Jong Un, Erdogan, Iran and so on. And China is doing it in the South China Sea although they do have serious designs there both for greater economic hegemony in Asia and leverage on Taiwan.
The Russians do seek advantage by as much info as they can gather. I do think at some point, the notion of when are these virtual acts really acts of war is a good question in an age when everything we need and rely on has key elements depending on a safe and stable cyber space.
The Iranians were deep inside the electric grid in March 2019 and last I read we never did determine what they may have done while they were in there. Install malicious code? Maybe. Add hidden "back doors" that they can get back in again undetected. Likely. At the point that the Iranians turn out our lights, I expect we'll turn theirs off too, and harder and for longer if we want. Many don't know but we hack into folks too. And we have plenty of missiles to take out power plants and power grids too if we want to really hurt them for a long time. But that action has serious consequences because as the power goes out for the Ministry of Defense and the Republican Guard it also goes out for the hospitals and refrigerated food storage warehouses. So how does all that play in the court of global public opinion. Maybe it gets us more respect in the short term but diminishes us in the long term. Hard choices.
We, of late, and this includes not only Trump who is clueless in these matters, but also the Obama administration, have been bad about drawing bright red lines not to cross. Some of this is political and deciding what you want to focus on (or be distracted by) but some is, what are the good options to take action without taking it too far? Trump ignored a lot, Obama I don't think thought the distractions and possible negative consequences risked were worth it for America long term.
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