That was part of the premise of the Three Body Problem (slight spoilers ahead): technology advances so quickly on a universal timeline, that in the time span be

That was part of the premise of the Three Body Problem (slight spoilers ahead): technology advances so quickly on a universal timeline, that in the time span between detecting an alien civilization and being able to do anything about it (assuming no FTL communication/travel), the detected civilization will have advanced to the point of being an existential threat to your own civilization, so the only logical response to detecting another civilization is to immediately destroy it if possible, or remain hidden otherwise. This is his answer to the Fermi paradox. I thought it was quite clever.