Top senator calls Salt Typhoon ‘worst telecom hack in our nation’s history’: The severity of the Chinese breach highlights the need for more telecommunications regulation, lawmakers say.

In October 2024, Salt Typhoon was discovered to have exploited backdoors in US internet service provider networks used by law enforcement agencies to facilitate court-authorized wiretapping.[9] Affected networks included those of AT&T, Verizon, Lumen Technologies, and T-Mobile.

The networks are still compromised, and booting the hackers out could involve physically replacing “literally thousands and thousands and thousands of pieces of equipment across the country,” specifically outdated routers and switches, Warner said.

Telecoms using outdated equipment is on par for these boys.