No, the US Government Should Not Disclose All Vulnerabilities in Its Possession

Written by Rick Ledgett, the Deputy Director of the NSA from January 2014 through April 2017.

> Such disclosure would be tantamount to unilateral disarmament in an area where the U.S. cannot afford to be unarmed... It is no exaggeration to say that giving up those capabilities would cost lives.

> Software vendors need to continue working to build better software, and to provide patching support for software deployed in critical infrastructure. Customers need to budget and plan for upgrades as part of the going-in cost of IT, or for compensatory measures when upgrades are impossible. Those who discover vulnerabilities need to responsibly disclose them or, if they are retained for national security purposes, adequately safeguard them. And the partnership of intelligence, law enforcement, and industry needs to work together to identify and disrupt actors who use these vulnerabilities for their criminal and destructive ends