• The Salt Typhoon hack is one of the largest attacks on U.S. telecommunications ever, officials say.

• The year-long attack originated in China and targeted major telecommunications companies such as AT&T and Verizon.

• The NSA believes that Chinese hackers are targeting high-ranking US politicians.

US security officials have warned that millions of people’s personal data could be at risk after a years-long hacking campaign originating in China.

The U.S. government began investigating the hack over the summer after Microsoft — which dubbed the hack “Salt Typhoon” — raised the alarm about anomalies.

Speaking to reporters on Saturday, White House deputy national security adviser Anne Neuberger said that while the data of millions of Americans was likely compromised, the hack targeted senior U.S. officials.

“We believe that the calls they recorded and received were directed more at high-level politicians,” she said.

Chinese hackers may have sought access to presidential candidates’ communications, according to a Congressional Research Office report. “With this access, they could potentially access unencrypted communications (e.g., voice calls and text messages),” the report said.

According to NBC, a senior NSA official said in October that hackers from China had accessed information from AT&T, Verizon and Lumen Technologies.

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Mark Warner told The Washington Post that the hack was “by far the worst telecommunications hack in our country’s history.”

“This is an ongoing attempt by China to infiltrate telecommunications systems around the world and exfiltrate vast amounts of data,” Warner told the medium.

The New York Times reported that hackers from China went undetected inside American telecommunications companies for more than a year and obtained a nearly complete list of phone numbers that the Justice Department monitors in its Lawful Intercept system. The lawful intercept system allows law enforcement to intercept or intercept telephone conversations by court order.

The FBI warned that all U.S. citizens should use a cell phone whose operating system is automatically updated and that they should use encryption and multifactor authentication for email and social media accounts.

Neuberger said in an earlier news conference Wednesday that the government does not believe any of the targeted telecommunications companies have “completely removed” the Chinese hackers from their networks and communications remain at risk. Senior White House officials said on the call that the hack was “probably one to two years in the making.”

“President Biden has been briefed on this compromise multiple times,” Neuberger told reporters. She added that the White House “has made it a priority that the federal government do everything in its power to get to the bottom of this.”

Neuberger said White House leaders are meeting three times a week to discuss the hack.

The Senate Commerce Subcommittee will hold a hearing on December 11 to discuss security threats to communications networks and examine best practices for providers to mitigate consumer risks. The committee will focus the hearing on the Salt Typhoon attacks.

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