I'm glad Ashley Madison was hacked. People who put blame on the hackers are idiots. The hackers are not the individuals who have misled their spouses and family, the people who signed up for Ashley Madison are. Ashley Madison endorses immoral behaviour just so they can profit from such behaviour.
It is a good thing that this site was hacked and had all of the data contained within it revealed to the public.
Biderman (the CEO of Ashley Madison) stated "he would be devastated" if he had discovered that his wife used this site. Clearly he does not approve of these practices, but wanted to profit from it all the same.

I often find myself asking "Is this the right thing to do?"
I do not find myself asking "Is this against the law?" Sometimes the law can be corrupt, it is systematically placed to protect those with power. However, this is a discussion for another time when such a thread should arise.

Yeah, real life isn't a Taken movie.

The hacking of personal info... Bad.

To the members? If you didn't have your hand in the cookie jar, it wouldn't have got stuck. No sympathy.

That's an even worse analogy. Because putting someone in prison isn't a crime.

Nice of her to have bought you a Mazda 6 with your own money :)

Blackmailing? A bit of a stretch. The information leaked is the information they themselves put on the website. It's already cheating so, clearly risks of being caught are already there...

Are they blackmailing themselves?

No. Some people are using the hack data to blackmail others.

In the US its akin to jay-walking (also "illegal"), almost no one gets put in jail for it, because it that was the case, 1/2 the damn US adult population would be in jail. 

Yes there are fundamentalist countries that actually do punish people for it, but it's usually ass backwards countries where women can't drive or wear a miniskirt either (welcome to ISIS Land). 

That data is public domain now. Literally anyone can view it now (with access to the internet). 
These people that are allowing themselves to be blackmailed is silly, seeing as even if they meet the blackmailers terms, anyone else can stumble upon that information now anyway. It would be best just to fess up, rather than playing the sympathy card "I was caught with the intention to cheat, and now people are using it against me, WAH!"
The hackers revealed the information to the public, like I said in a previous post, the hackers are not the individuals who have led the families astray and deceived them, that is on the partners and this website that profits from such behaviour. Not only are these people wilfully cheating on their partners, they are spending money to do so. This is a new low.

Biderman (the CEO of Ashley Madison) stated "he would be devastated" if he had discovered that his wife used this site. Clearly he does not approve of these practices, but wanted to profit from it all the same. 

Hackers can be used for good, and they can be used for bad. Just like anyone with the knowledge and power to do so. When hackers reveal corruption within the government and corruptions, this is good for society. People need to know about these things. 
What people do with this information is on them, whether they use it for good or bad, that's on them.

People been cheating for centuries.Marriage is an overrated and outdated concept anyway.As is religion.