Not trying to justify the other commenters but, for what it's worth, you actually seem to have misread the sentence from what I can see in your original comment. In particular, the way you separated the phrase "hacking and distributing [stuff]" into the pull quotes

> hacking

> distributing [stuff]

makes it appear as though you read it like "hacking: distributing [stuff]" instead of "hacking and distributing [stuff]". I believe to your point, it would be ridiculous for them to write "was reportedly caught bragging about hacking: distributing pirated e-books, bootleg software, and game cheats" but that's not what they wrote. They are referring individually to "hacking" and "distributing" as separate and distinct things.

You are absolutely correct, upon further review I seem to have misread it. Thank you for pointing that out, that's definitely an error on my part. Thank you for assuming good faith as well.