its hotel security though. they will not know what a flipper is apart from being a "hacking tool", and maybe they heard some other terms associated like "radio", "wifi", and whatever. They're just doing what they've been instructed to do to retain their job

yeah, their boss is the one I am mad at

The hotel general manger who probably spent less than 10 minutes thinking about how to differentiate ‘hacking tools’ from random electronics?

And that’s assuming they thought about it all, instead of just forwarding a vaguely remembered email.