I’m really not sure why it seems like most people here think context matters, but you keep insisting that it doesn’t. The two parts of that second sentence, which you treat as separate statements, were literally linked with a dash. It’s also not like the statement or its parts stood alone:
The first sentence implies disapproval of the hackers’ previous antics. The second one first concedes that they also hit someone the commenter dislikes, which in that context is a clear setup for a “but”, which follows and makes it clear that this isn’t enough to redeem them, since the motive likely isn’t ideological nor political, but plain greed.
You’re taking a sentence in isolation and pretending its meaning is self-contained. That’s not how human language works.