Sources close to the investigation into how the NSA's surveillance tools and zero-day exploits that they used ended up in the hands of hackers say the service knew about their loss three years ago but kept it quiet.
These sources reported to Reuters that a survey of service data published by a group called Shadow Brokers showed that the leak was already known by the NSA.
It also showed that the hack was not done on the service itself and that the leaked data did not come from informant Edward Snowden. According to the same sources, it seems that he came from one of the NSA executives who "forgot" them.
The US intelligence official has left the NSA for other reasons. Sensitive tools were allegedly left behind on an external server – possibly a bounce box – after an operation. Hackers then breached it machine, broke in and found themselves in front of the NSA's sensitive data. The NSA executive informed his agency after the incident, but they did not alert them Companies like Cisco that their customers were at risk.
The NSA silenced the event.
The most elegant chance-point of view for the fact is that the service kept this secret to see who would use them, watching the traffic on the Internet.
Η άλλη άποψη που δεν συμφέρει την ΝSA είναι ότι δεν αποκάλυψε άμεσα την κλοπή των εργαλείων για να μην κλείσουν οι εταιρείες που επηρεαζόταν τα κενά security. If the latter is true, the intelligence service preferred to put thousands of the companies' customers at risk.
According to the US government, the guidelines state that if NSA estimates that the severity of zero-day defects is high, it finds and informs affected companies.
Read about the NSA hack
Edward Snowden: Why is NSA Hack Important?
Hacked the NSA's Equation Group
Can NSA steal Cisco VPN private keys?
