Jeff Simon, T-Mobile's Chief Security Officer, who has since been promoted to Chief Information Officer, revealed in 2024 that hackers had attempted to intrude on its network through a wireline company's network that was connected to T-Mobile's.
The Un-carrier detected the threat early enough to block access to customer data and severed the connection to the compromised provider's network. The carrier has now provided more details to Bloomberg.
Simon recounts how, back in 2024, T-Mobile was already vigilant due to a 2023 breach that exposed the data of 37 million customers. When employees learned of the Salt Typhoon attack, they flagged a router behaving suspiciously at a California data center. It was communicating with another T-Mobile device. When they checked on the router, it was powered off.
That's when Simon ordered the device to be ripped out. Since the shady activity couldn't have been coming from the shut-off router, they dug deeper and were then able to trace the activity to another provider's router in Chicago. It had been disguised to imitate the one in California to make it easy to connect with the other T-Mobile device, which was at a data center near the Bellevue headquarters.
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Simon and his colleagues drove to the location and snipped the cable connecting the device to the network using a pair of scissors.
How do you feel about T-Mobile's timely detection?
You can never be too careful
T-Mobile later reactivated the router in an isolated environment and analyzed it. It was too late to learn about the attackers, who were long gone by then.
While the cybercriminals weren't able to breach T-Mobile's core infrastructure or subscriber data, they did get into some other routing infrastructure on the edge of the network.
Simon could have been less dramatic and switched the router off virtually, but he says that sometimes a low-tech solution works best.
There’s nothing that replaces cutting the cord.
Jeff Simon, T-Mobile's Chief Information Officer, August 2026
The severed cable is displayed at the company's headquarters as a badge of honor.
Access to T-Mobile's core routers could have allowed the hackers to wreak havoc by siphoning off information, redirecting traffic, and injecting malicious software. US officials believed the attack to be geared more toward intelligence gathering.
The bad actors were able to steal the phone data of millions across the US, and even targeted the handsets of Donald Trump, JD Vance, and Kamala Harris.
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Anam Hamid is a computer scientist turned tech journalist who has a keen interest in the tech world, with a particular focus on smartphones and tablets. She has previously written for Android Headlines and has also been a ghostwriter for several tech and car publications. Anam is not a tech hoarder and believes in using her gadgets for as long as possible. She is concerned about smartphone addiction and its impact on future generations, but she also appreciates the convenience that phones have brought into our lives. Anam is excited about technological advancements like folding screens and under-display sensors, and she often wonders about the future of technology. She values the overall experience of a device more than its individual specs and admires companies that deliver durable, high-quality products. In her free time, Anam enjoys reading, scrolling through Reddit and Instagram, and occasionally refreshing her programming skills through tutorials.
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