Though I do not think this story has anything to do with MAPP.

MAPP or no MAPP, Microsoft does not have the technical capability to produce reliable exploits for all of the vulnerabilities it's made aware of.

Also, we both know NSA has a (less-well-known) charter for coordinating vulnerability response and computer security across the agencies; NSA has a public huge defensive interest in this stuff as well.

NSA doesn't need Microsoft to enable it to break into arbitrary Windows machines. But it might need their help to keep up with every attack vector on Microsoft code, which is what you need to do if you're doing defensive work.

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130614/02110223467/micros...

"National Security Administration doesn't need Microsoft to break into computers." vs "The National Security Administration doesn't need Microsoft to break into computers."

Too much of a tangent, perhaps?

I did enough research to conclude that it was not a settled issue. Its clear that if the initials were lower case and referred to a generic agency that deals with national security it would be "the national security agency" similar to the "the fishing tackle section of a sporting goods store." On the other hand a gander at DoD's style guide[1] makes it clear that they do not like the "the."

I'd love to see why you think its opposite. That's not dickish, that's a desire to answer a question that's been nagging me for a long time.

[1] http://www.dtic.mil/whs/directives/corres/writing/Writing_St...

From the english.SX:

"Is it proper to use “the” before the name of a government organization?" http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/76976/is-it-prope...

"Using the definite article with acronyms and initialisms" http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/30596/using-the-d...

"Definite article with proper nouns, titles followed by a common noun" http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/2327/definite-art...

"The definite article usage with objects that have names" http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/16988/the-definit...

"Capitalising the definite article in names" http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/84288/capitalisin...

Similarly, "the Department of Defense", "the National Security Agency".

Don't believe it? See what the agency calls itself on its website: http://www.nsa.gov/