Episode #1.1

This programme contains strong language and scenes some viewers may find distressing

SHE STRAINS

MUTED HAMMER TAPS

HOLLOW THUDDING

RAPID TYPING

LOCK RATTLES

MECHANICAL GEARS CLINKING

ELEVATOR BELL DINGS

ENTRY KEYPAD BEEPS

SHE SIGHS

BELL RINGS

APPLAUSE

Well done, Gabriel.

I think that's the fastest it's ever been done. Congratulations.

INDISTINCT CHATTER

I like your pens.

They're in spectrum order.

And before you say that pink is in the wrong place,

pink has nothing to do with red.

It's actually white absent green.

Well done on the challenge.

They're obviously going to take you.

You were incredibly fast.

If we're going to talk, I should warn you, I'm not very good

at noticing when people want to speak or change the subject,

so the conversation could last half an hour,

or several days... It's OK, it's OK.

I'm Saara, by the way.

I'm Gabriel.

KEYS JANGLE

SHE INHALES

It's fine... Hello, Ami.

Oh, my God. What are you doing here?

Why didn't you ring? Is everything OK?

I'm fine. I was just passing.

Just passing? What are you talking about?

London's over an hour away.

You'll stay for...? Where's Abu?

Sorry.

Is he still at work?

He's in his den.

He's off work again.

Abu? DOOR SHUTS

Hey.

So...

..have you heard?

I got it. Ah!

HE EXCLAIMS

Oh, yes...

You haven't told your mother?

You know she wouldn't understand. Of course not.

They don't know anything about it.

Good.

Come. Sit, sit.

Mum said you're off work again, Abu. Are you OK?

I'm fine. I was a bit down, but I'm fine now.

I'll be back on Monday.

Down...like last time?

No, nothing like that.

Anyway, when I see you, I feel better.

How long can you stay?

I'm sorry, Abu... I have to get back tonight.

You've got classes in the morning.

I'm really sorry. Oh, don't be ridiculous.

Classes are important.

But you have time for a quick game?

Of course. Excellent!

You do think it's OK, Abu?

What I'm doing.

Ah, this girl.

You'll be spending a year learning to defend our country,

and at the end you go back to university.

What could be wrong with that, huh?

Hmm...

Oh... Ha.

Hey. You'll be brilliant.

Yeah.

We're in.

Happy for us to move to the next step?

Go.

OK, let's get some resilience.

They're inside.

They've broken in.

How?

It doesn't matter how. We'll work it out later.

Get going.

I want them out.

I told you this was a bad idea.

We've accessed credentials for your ops and management system.

What? OK to proceed?

They've got the passwords. They're about to log in.

Wait.

Zahir? ALARMS SOUNDING

Zahir?

I'm seeing red lights, Tahmid. What's going on?

CONFUSED CLAMOUR

We're down. We're down.

What the fuck...

What did you do?

Uh, nothing.

We're just logging in to the system now...

Finn?

Erm...

Yep. Uh, looks like the internet.

What do you mean, the internet?

I think we're offline. Can't be.

Do you know what, pull out now.

I want you completely disconnected from our estate.

CALL ALERT

Hey. My line just went down. What's going on?

You'd better get up here.

Sorry to keep you waiting.

I'm Max.

Hi.

Oh, we're not shaking hands at the moment.

Oh.

Of course. Sorry.

Well, welcome to GCHQ.

Tell me.

We have a serious problem.

Your stress test just took down half our infrastructure.

Whatever you did, you need to undo it, right now,

before it starts to impact on public safety.

Rich? Can't be us, boss.

We never got beyond the admin platform.

HE EXHALES OK.

Sorry, I'm totally overdressed.

Oh, don't worry.

We all make that mistake on our first day.

We're very glad to have you.

As you can see, we're hideously male, stale and pale.

Sorry?

Old and white.

Like me.

I hope that's not why you picked me.

Because I've got a brown face.

No, of course not.

Where are you going?

We've been summoned.

Why don't you come?

You might find this interesting.

Erm, BT Openreach provides the infrastructure for most of

the UK's internet. At 0907 this morning, whilst we were

stress-testing their systems, they experienced a partial shutdown,

impacting, as far as we can tell, about 55% of internet provision.

Oh, Chrissie, have you met Max? He's our head of malware.

Hi. How you doing?

Now, we're still checking, obviously, but so far

it looks like National Grid's ICS is OK.

Same with gas and water. Rail signalling is down...

Are you sure it's OK for me to be here?

But the motorway signals... Why not? You're DV cleared, aren't you?

Air traffic control is still up, but it seems most of the flights

have stopped, because they use the internet to control aircraft

on the ground. Uh, online banking is down,

and some of their core comms are affected.

So, most of the cash machines are offline...

What about smartphones?

Sorry. Caroline Fitch, Number 10.

Chrissie, can smartphones get online?

Chrissie's head of security at BT.

Yeah, as far as we can tell.

But a lot of the systems they access are affected,

so there's not much they can do.

Erm, some of the big email servers are down.

There's no Zoom, no Teams,

which has taken out all the new hospital appointments.

Uh, there's no online shopping.

But social media is unaffected, interestingly.

All in all, quite cleverly targeted to cause significant disruption

without actually putting that many lives at risk.

So, it's a cyber attack? That's what you're saying?

We think so, yeah.

Virgin was also affected, which rules out the stress test

as the cause, or any hardware problems within BT.

That only really leaves malware, and using the stress test as a cover.

Can I jump in?

Uh, yeah, go ahead.

Kathy's one of our analysts, on attachment from the NSA.

So, the Russian bots are already retweeting,

and it is mostly about how all the ATMs are down.

Uh... "Another fuck-up by this shit-for-brains government."

"Just another scam by the elite to steal our money."

"The bankers are screwing us over again." Yada, yada.

It's a bit quick, don't you think?

I mean, it's almost like they knew it was coming.

Thanks.

So, is that it?

The malware?

Yep.

Mind if I take a look?

SAARA TYPING

What's all this garbage?

I don't understand.

It's obfuscated.

Some kind of FinFisher thing.

Hey. It's Kathy, right?

Yeah. NSA would like to take a look at the code.

Well, has Danny approved it?

Well, he told me to update them.