What does hacking into Yandex give us other than a reason for Russia to do the same?
No, the West does not claim 'moral superiority' over Russia due to any kind of ostensible 'non participation' in espionage.
There is no 'hoping they don't find out' because it's accepted that it's happening. We only 'hope they don't find out' about specific activities.
It would give US intelligence insights in to operations from China, Russia, North Korea, Iran, etc.
No you haven't. If you had then you would keep it to yourself - I do.
Or the things it has caught don't make newspaper headlines. Because the plots were defused, and thus can't be used to cause chaos and fear in citizens, something newspapers seem to delight in.
That sounds like conspiracy thinking. The media isn't able to suppress the CIA's good deeds, and I don't believe they'd try. "Big alien invasion averted thanks to heroic CIA agent" is a great headline. So great in fact, that fiction books are written on that premise.
With all the minor and major leaks from the intelligence community, they're supposed to have a super tight and successful conspiracy going to hide the fact that they are actually effective? I have some doubts, both on the technical part (large conspiracies are hard) and the reasoning.
They have a demonstrable history of lies and terrorist-style anti-democratic activities themselves for political and economic purposes.
Can you explain the reasoning beyond "yes"?
Information is power and the "right" information, even more so.
Note that I'm not questioning the existence of intelligence services, I'm asking you to provide basis that directly attacking companies like that is worth it. Also where's the line that makes this "dirty" business worth it?
lmao
why would Russia need this reason?
Russia does not need this or any other reason, they are already doing this to the extent they can. The public nature of this will provide some political cover, but that's it.
As to 'what it gets' it entirely depends on the kind of information that was obtained, the inherent risks and cost, the targets etc..
Maybe there were specific targets, a specific needs, maybe they were casting a net - who knows.