I'm not sure the distinction matters, and attribution is inherently hard and easy to get wrong. I frequently read Country X is doing Y, less as a indicator of government action and more of a single that we can't be more specific of who within the country is performing an action but we know the behavior is occurring there.

In the case of IP address purchases, these are publicly tied to specific public and private entities and can be easily queried through the regional registries. These private entities are frequently the same kind of shell company you'll get with hiding shady financial details.