NSA Zero Day Tools Likely Left Behind By Careless Operative

More information is surfacing on the source of the NSA's hacking tools discovered and published by the Shadow Brokers. Just as Ed Snowden pointed out shortly after the tools first appeared online, the problem with sticking a stash of hacking tools on equipment you don't own is that others can access the tools, too… especially if an operative doesn't follow through on the more mundane aspects of good opsec.

    Here's where it gets interesting: the NSA is not made of magic. Our rivals do the same thing to us -- and occasionally succeed. Knowing this, NSA's hackers (TAO) are told not to leave their hack tools ("binaries") on the server after an op. But people get lazy.

Reuters has exclusive (but anonymous) interviews with personnel involved in the investigation which indicates other, more exculpatory theories are likely wrong.

    Various explanations have been floated by officials in Washington as to how the tools were stolen. Some feared it was the work of a leaker similar to former agency contractor Edward Snowden, while others suspected the Russians might have hacked into NSA headquarters in Fort Meade, Maryland.

    But officials heading the FBI-led investigation now discount both of those scenarios, the people said in separate interviews.

    NSA officials have told investigators that an employee or contractor made the mistake about three years ago during an operation that used the tools, the people said.