He was never hiding his hacker background and even talked a bit about it in a big german TV show:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aeHWXXWa--oThere are no english subtitles, but he basically says, that he - maybe among other things - hacked Call of Duty to become the #1 player in this game. He also sold these "opportunities" (as he calls it) to other players then. It's not a crime or illegal according to his point of view.
This is simply not true. He did hide it.
Hacking computer games is not the same as Hacking and defacing websites, installing keyloggers, selling administration logins, selling site databases, and buying, using and selling remote access trojans.
Don't forget that he stole all the identification information from people trying to reclaim their lost IOTA.
2 years later and those same people are asking where their lost IOTA is and what happened with all the personal information they sent to this "hacker".