Senator says AT&T and Verizon blocked release of Salt Typhoon security reports

Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) speaks t during a hearing in the U.S. Capitol on December 17, 2025 in Washington, DC. Heather Diehl/Getty Images

Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., said Tuesday that Verizon and AT&T are preventing the release of documents tied to Salt Typhoon, a Chinese cyber collective that infiltrated U.S. telecom networks and other communications systems around the world.

Cantwell wrote in a letter that she sought network security assessments conducted by Google-owned cybersecurity firm Mandiant, but said the company declined to hand over the materials after receiving direction from both AT&T and Verizon.

Now, Cantwell wants the companies' chief executives to testify before Congress.

Both carriers, which were accessed by the hackers at some point before the breaches were discovered in 2024, “have chosen not to cooperate, which raises serious questions about the extent to which Americans who use these networks remain exposed to unacceptable risk ...