Malware Case Is Major Blow for the N.S.A. - The New York Times

Excerpt from a stark NSA reality check

"Michael Sulmeyer, a former top Pentagon policy official who now runs the cybersecurity program at Harvard’s Kennedy School, said the Shadow Brokers episode was a “disaster” for the National Security Agency that underscored how the stakes of leaks from the agency had changed.

“Ten years ago, the costs were fairly low for things going wrong at N.S.A.,” Mr. Sulmeyer said. Then, he said, leaks could cut off important sources of intelligence, but today the agency wields powerful malicious software. “Now,” he said, “there’s a risk for public safety.”

The agency has spent hundreds of millions in taxpayer dollars to develop an arsenal of stealthy software tools to break into foreign computer networks and gather intelligence. When it lost control of those exploits, it was a less lethal version of the Air Force awakening one morning to find many fighter jets missing — and then learning that the fighters were randomly strafing cities around the globe."

Malware Case Is Major Blow for the N.S.A. - The New York Times