> certain illegal acts (like breaking into certain websites, illegally obtaining documents, etc.) should be legal if done for the purpose of proper journalism

This isn't the case in any country and almost certainly should not be.

In some countries, a journalist is generally free to publish anonymously sourced information, regardless of its source (which may have been a hack), and report on that information. Journalists are never allowed to hack websites. Hacking websites isn't legal.

Making some level of allowed-hacker as long as they're labeled a journalist would be crazy, as it would (1) result in the aforementioned semantic debate over who is a journalist, (2) would be the antithesis of privacy to have hackers that are allowed to hack you legally.