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.
Yeah, but he did he say that you could give them the code?
KATHY SIGHS
So, you want me to walk all the way back down the hall?
Really? Absolutely.
That's the way we do it here.
You do know that they're only trying to help?
We're on the same team, guys.
51st state.
You see these jumps?
Mm-hm.
They hop over the garbage.
So it's never actually read?
That's right.
So what's it there for?
To confuse the look of the code,
so the anti-virus software won't recognise it as malware.
OK, how do we get round it?
We find a reverser that locates all the garbage.
And then we write a programme to delete it.
Is that what you're doing now?
Amongst other things.
Can I help?
No.
So what do you want me to do?
We have a test environment.
Do you mean a sandbox?
Paste in the code and see if you can get it to run in there.
It's isolated so you can't do any harm and we might learn something.
I'd really prefer to help with the reversing.
Danny, it's the Foreign Secretary.
Well, can we schedule a conversation before then?
Yes, I'd like that.
Thanks.
Elizabeth. How are you holding up?
Erm, I have had better days, and nights.
Interesting timing, don't you think,
right in the middle of an election campaign?
Yeah. Will it have much of an impact?
People not being able to get online?
Absolutely.
Feeds straight into the populist agenda.
The Government's crap, can't organise a piss-up in a brewery.
Plus Labour does most of its campaigning online,
so the Internet going down looks very convenient for us.
So now we're corrupt, as well as incompetent.
Anyway, where are we?
We are currently about 35% restored.
It's not straightforward unfortunately.
There's a lot of anti-debugging tricks in the code, so...
I imagine you're assuming it's Russia?
Well, as you know,
we try to avoid making attributions prematurely.
Anything in the code which suggests
a particular team could be a misdirection.
And as soon as we point the finger,
then there's pressure to retaliate,
and we're into a tit-for-tat escalation.
But what's your gut?
That it's probably Russia. Most likely FSB.
OK, because, according to our embassy in Moscow,
the lights have been flashing on,
and off in Putin's office for the last half hour.
Really?
So that's nothing to do with you, then?
No, but if it's true, then that's pretty funny.
Yes, hysterical,
as long as it's not us or anyone acting as our proxy.
Can you check please, Danny?
Yes.
I don't understand.
It ran inside BT's computers. Why won't it run here?
You can write malware so it knows when it's in a sandbox.
It searches for normal computer activity.
If it can't find any, it deactivates.
Is there a workaround?
You could paste in some Word documents,
scroll around a bit.
That can make it think that it's in a real environment.
But it's not always a guarantee.
Can I use this?
Do you always change the subject like that?
Sorry, I? Why do you need it?
If there's something you don't understand, you can just ask me.
It's not about work. I need to make an outside call.
I didn't know they were going to take my phone off me at reception.
Yeah, it's nine and then the number.
Paste in those Word documents, right?
Mr Prime Minister, throughout this election campaign you've made
a great deal of the fact that you are Britain's first black Prime
Minister and that you understand ordinary working people.
But your father was an incredibly wealthy Nigerian businessman,
and you spent your childhood in one of Britain's top public schools.
Oh, come on, Campbell, not that old chestnut?
Look, I don't think that's what people are worrying about at all.
I think they're worrying about... Isn't it? Isn't it, Prime Minister?
This country's in the middle of the deepest recession this century...
Hello, this is Ahmed.
Please leave a message after the tone. Thank you.
VOICEMAIL MESSAGE REPEATED IN ANOTHER LANGUAGE
TONE
Hi, Abu, it's me.
Just checking in to see how you're feeling.
You can't really ring me back here but I'll try again later.
Love you.
ON TV: I don't know what you're implying, Campbell,
but I live here too, you know, and this recession has nothing to do
with Brexit, which is a huge success.
Kathy? Have you got a moment? Sure. What do you need?
The Jolly Roger? Jolly Roger.
"You've been Rogered"?
Subtle.
Oh. He blames Russia for the attack
and he says that he's retaliating. Calls himself a patriotic hacker.
Right. That's all we need.
Yeah.
This is nothing to do with any of you? No. No. Nothing.
No? No-one's encouraged him? Not at all. Nope.
No.
How do you think he knows that it's Russia?
He doesn't. He's just grandstanding.
But this is all anyone's going to remember.
When we come out with the official attribution,
no-one's going to be listening.
All right, thanks, Kathy.
Oh, did you get my message?
No, I don't think I did.
NSA's asked to see the malware code. Is that cool?
Erm, yeah, why not?
Thanks. What's the problem?
Oh, there's no problem. OK.
ON TV: Almost certainly not the image party election managers wanted
on your TV screens tonight.
The Prime Minister being aggressively heckled while
campaigning in Bristol.
And, as a precaution,
I'll be chairing a COBRA meeting on Sunday at 10am.
In the meantime...
CROWD SHOUT OVER EACH OTHER In the meantime,
in the face of this criminal and unprovoked cyber-attack,
I have instructed the security forces
to do whatever's necessary to find out who's responsible.
CROWD NOISE INCREASES
And to ensure that your services and access to your bank accounts,
and your hard-earned savings, are absolutely safe and...
MUMBLING
Thank you. Thank you.
Extraordinary scenes here.
The Prime Minister's rarely been seen outside
the Westminster bubble since,
as a junior minister not even in the Cabinet,
he ousted Boris Johnson in
a particularly bloody palace coup 15 months ago.
But with the Conservatives running six points behind in
the polls, this campaign is confronting him with
a very real anger some feel about the economic crisis,
and just how deep the disillusionment
with authority in general now runs.
Phil.
I still couldn't get it to run in the sandbox,
so I thought I'd take a look at the code itself.
I hope you don't mind.
I think I might have found something.
Ah, that's OK. We've all done it.
Done what?
Tried to reverse a library.
It's boilerplate code.
It's just there to avoid the coder having
to write some common functions from scratch.
It's the one bit you don't need to bother reversing.
I know what a library is.
I think there's something else hidden in there.
Probably thought we wouldn't bother checking.
Saara found it, one of our work experience students.
Thanks.
It's a dropper, right? Yeah, tiny.
That's why we missed it the first time round.
If you run it, it raises a flag.
What's the flag?
Saara?
A like.
On this Facebook page.
I suppose someone somewhere must be monitoring it.
It's a tripwire. If they see a like on the story,
then they know we've downloaded the payload.
I presume you've managed to pull it down without tripping it?
I think so. And? I'm not sure yet. It's obfuscated, like the last one.
HE SIGHS
Danny. There's a second virus, hidden inside the first.
I think we should upgrade to a Level One attack.
Level One? Really?
Yeah, I think so. This degree of sophistication.
And maybe we should call JSTAT,
get them to raise the threat level to Critical?
We don't know what this new one does yet.
OK, I'll call Number 10. Thanks.
Right, shut it down. OK?
And find out what it was meant to do. Quick as you can please.
Got it.
Well done, Saara.
Excuse me.
CHANTING
PHONE RINGS
Hi. Where are you? Why didn't you call back?
Why, what's wrong?
Abu's had an accident.
On the tracks.
What? He's in the hospital.
You need to come.
I can't. Not right now.
Just give me... He's asking for you, Saar.
You need to get back here.
I will. I'll get a train as soon as this is done.
I'll be there soon. Pass please, Ma'am.
Thought we'd lost you. Are you OK?
My dad's not well.
Do you need to go?
No, it's OK.
Plug in, they're about to start.
Saara, do you want to follow me?
Go on, then.
Leave it. You won't need it.
..about 70% left. See you in a bit.
Andy, good to see you. We'll catch up after the meeting.
Home Secretary, nice to see you. Hi.
Do you want to sit down, just there?
QUIET CONVERSATION
As you will know from the CRIP,
we've located the malware within BT's systems and,
with some round-the-clock work,
its code has been 70% reverse engineered.
Based on what we've learnt,
I'm confident we can have most of the Internet back up
and running by midnight tonight.
As far as we can tell,
this virus has never been seen in the wild before,
which means it was specially written to take down sections of the BT,
and Virgin infrastructures,
which is quite a feat, considering the built-in safety features.
Perhaps most notably, it doesn't seem to be communicating
with any sort of home base, which is unusual.
Really? Is that the most notable thing?
Because I'd say it's the devastating effect it's having on our economy,
which is already in recession. And which,
I can tell you from personal experience,
is going down with voters like a bucket of cold sick.
It could have been worse, Prime Minister.
How?
Well, if the attack had happened on Monday morning.
Instead of on Friday.
Which is, in fact, exactly what would have happened,
Prime Minister, if it hadn't been for the sharp eyes of one
of our work-experience students,
who spotted something else, hidden inside the malware code.
Danny.
Yeah, at 9am tomorrow morning,
a second stage attack was set to activate,
this time taking out the entire Internet,
with potentially catastrophic results.
The whole country, including vital services,
would have been left unable to get online,
just as the Monday morning rush began.
And this is the young student who spotted it.
WHISPERS: Stand up.
Do we know who's responsible?
For the attack?
We're still working on that.
Well, the Jolly Roger seems to know,
judging by the way he's flashing the lights off
and on in Putin's office.
Perhaps we're relying on him for our cyber responses nowadays.
I'm sorry to interrupt this happy moment,
Prime Minister, but I'd be glad of some clarification, if that's OK?
You say the second malware was spotted by this young woman.
What's her name?
Saara Parvin.
And she's a student?
Yes, that's right.
And the rest of GCHQ just...
..missed it?
I'm sorry, is that something we're supposed to applaud?
I mean, it's hardly reassuring, is it?
If she hadn't been doing her work experience or whatever it was,
the entire panoply of our cyber security apparatus would have missed
an extremely dangerous attack,
paralysing commercial life in this country for
the second time in four days.
If a student could find this thing and the rest of you didn't,
how do we know there isn't something else hiding in there...
..waiting to go off at 11am tomorrow?
Or 2pm or whenever?
I think you'd better go back and take another look, don't you?
See what else you've missed.
And let's have some options for an offensive cyber attack on Russia.
I'd like to know what we can do to retaliate.
OK.
Get everybody back tonight.
10pm. Bring them all in.
Where have you been?
How is he? Where have you been, Saara?
I got here as quickly as I could.
SHE SOBS
What's happened?
Tell me.
Abu died. About half an hour ago.
It's OK, Ami. It's OK.
SOBBING CONTINUES
Are you sure you want to do this?
What was he doing on the tracks?
They're not sure.
There's going to have to be an investigation.
SHE SOBS
They're withholding his body.
What?
What, why? There's going to have to be a postmortem.
So can't we bury him?
The police won't let us.
Not yet. Why?
Is it because it might be suicide? Saara!
I'll get you some tea. No.
Saara can get it.
It's fine, Ami. I'm not an invalid.
Why don't you just go? You know, if you're in such..?
SLAMS TABLE Enough, Ami!
Give her a break!
None of this is her fault. No, I won't give her a break.
Her father has just died and she shows nothing.
She looks at her watch!
All she ever thinks about is herself.
Why are you so selfish?
Tell me. Because I don't understand.
That's not fair, Mum. I'm sorry, I can't do this.
That's right, leave! Like you always do!
DOOR SLAMS
For those of you who don't know, we've just returned from
London where we were comprehensively beaten up at COBRA.
Yeah, but just because it was unpleasant,
doesn't mean it wasn't justified.
There was a Level One attack on the Internet on Friday,
and all of our focus has been on isolating the malware responsible
and disabling it.
With the pressure to get everything back up and running,
it's hardly surprising that we weren't looking as carefully as
we should for extra functionality in the code.
The fact that it was one of our work experience students that found it,
in a place we wouldn't ordinarily be looking,
probably doesn't reflect that well on us, if I'm honest.
Certainly not in the opinion of some of the members of COBRA, anyway.
SCATTERED LAUGHTER
So we're going to be going back over the malware code,
line by line, see what else is hiding in there.
It's a big task, and it's urgent.
We cannot afford to be caught out again.
Malware will be leading this and some of you will be reassigned
for a bit to help out. GROANS AND MURMURS
And shifts will be extended again, I'm afraid,
until this gets sorted.
OK. Sorry about that. Let's get to it.
Saara?
Hey, listen, I'm sorry about what I put you through at COBRA today.
I didn't see that coming.
You should go home. You look exhausted.
No, I'm fine, honestly.
I'm serious, Saara. You look terrible.
I can't. Everyone else is working.
Go home, OK?
You did a really good job today and it will still be here in the
morning, I promise you.
ON TV: A completely illegal and irresponsible attack,
which could have been far worse if it hadn't been for...
DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES
..the carefully prepared strategies we brought into play on Friday.
Everything will be fully back up and running by midnight.
In fact, many services have already been restored...
FOOTSTEPS
WHISPERING: Hey.
What incredible timing for your first day.
I thought they'd never let you out.
How was it?
What is it? What's wrong?
Saar?
My father died this evening.
I am so sorry, Saar.
What?
When? When? What happened?
You're probably hungry.
..countries like the United States, countries like France,
Spain, Germany and many others which believe in
and are prepared to stand up for the rule of law.
And I can assure you that we will respond to
the attack within the law,
and at a time and in a manner of our choosing.
NOTIFICATION
The rules based international...
Hi. Are you watching?
Yeah.
And how are we getting on with his options?
We're not. It's a really bad idea.
We have to do this, Danny.
Right. And to hell with the escalation?
Because that's where this leads. You know that.
OK.
Finn, get up here.
Yes, boss.
..can claim a similar legitimacy.
But just because this is a democracy,
it doesn't mean we are weak
or lack the will or the capability to defend ourselves.
And we will defend ourselves,
with all the force available to us, within the law.
Thank you.
SHE SOBS AND WHIMPERS
Subtitles by Red Bee Media