a little interdiction while that new airgapped laptop is shipped to you and they got you, even though you never connected to a network
(I’m presuming here that the laptop is openable, and that you will do so and physically remove any wi-fi M.2 card from it — and associated antennae — since you won’t be using it. There might be some sort of extra surface-mount snooper chip left onboard that could replicate the same function — but without big antennas, how’s it going to report?)
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2014/03/ragemaster_ns...
Or this?
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2014/03/cottonmouth-i...
If you have actually attracted the attention of the NSA, pulling your NIC is playground stuff.