All of his hacker ethos feels very superficial to me. I.e. get this or that gizmo under control etc. There does not seem to be a deep curiosity for CS or maths as such, rather a childish joy in opening other peoples locks and taking other peoples hardware under control.

That was cool in the 70's when telecoms infrastructure wasn't commoditized. I understand how enticing it is to hack big co telephone networks, for example. Big, big machines with very strict access rights.

2009. Computing and communications infrastructure is commoditized. The world is literally swimming in computers. There is no unusual computing or telecoms capability you can harness by breaking into another system. It just means you want to break into the system instead of actually using your own.

It's pedestrian and rude, like stealing someone's umbrella.

Plus, he breached the implicit trust in him as an employer.

10 years is a lot, though, for bad taste and disappointing social graces.