How the NSA successfully manage to prevent the Washington Post and friends from discovering and reporting on this malicious backdoor? They've been sitting on these documents for a decade. Are the journalists just that *uncurious* about the deep contents of the documents they hold exclusive access to? Was this some kind of organizational failing?
Some of them are deputies for the state. State-run-media, or Media-run-state, whichever you prefer. The FBI and CIA had agents inside Twitter and Facebook. Of course they have them inside news agencies as well. Part of it over time is access-media, the ones that play ball get the stories and info, the others get weeded out.
It's illegal for FBI or CIA to actively target a US company. Anyone doing so would be fired for cause.