"My fellow Americans, no hacker should be able to shut down our networks..." "A massive attack." "Data is inaccessible." "Or invade the privacy of American families." "You're being watched and recorded." "I urge this Congress to protect our children's information." "Dear brothers and sisters, now is the time to open your eyes." "I started intercepting all the traffic on your network." "That's when I noticed something strange." "That's when I decided to hack you." "[DRAMATIC MUSIC]" "We are fsociety!" "We are finally free!" "We are on the verge of taking down this virtual reality." "Exciting time in the world right now, exciting time." "♪ ♪" "So this is what a revolution looks like." "Why did you do it?" "I wanted to save the world." "(NARRATOR): "Mr. Robot," USA's Golden Globe and Peabody award-winning original drama about a vigilante hacker with a mission to change the world has engaged audiences like no other show." ""Mr. Robot" won two Golden Globes, three Critics' Choice Awards, but what really says something about "Mr. Robot" is fans found this show even before the critics showed up, even before the awards showed up." "(NARRATOR):" "Its realistic portrayal of a world where information is vulnerable, everyone is being watched, and anyone can be compromised has fueled its rise as a cultural phenomenon." ""Mr. Robot" comes at a time where you can't turn on the television or read a newspaper without hearing about some massive corporate or government hack." "(NARRATOR):" "But how much of the world portrayed by "Mr. Robot" is possible?" "A lot more than you might think." "Over the next hour, we'll examine what's truly at risk in our technology-obsessed world." "The only completely secure computer is a computer that no one can use." "(NARRATOR):" "We'll talk to the creator and cast as well as pop culture experts about why "Mr. Robot" has resonated so powerfully." "Something incredibly prophetic happened on the show, almost, you know, weeks away from it happening in real life." "(NARRATOR):" "And through unprecedented access to cybersecurity experts and real-life hackers, we'll reveal how "Mr. Robot" is mirroring real-world scenarios if not outright predicting them." "You look at the hacks that played out in season one... gaining access to Steel Mountain, bumping next to someone to steal and clone their proximity badge, getting a backdoor in a phone... all of those are hacks that we read about in the news" "every week now." "(NARRATOR):" "Plus, we'll also discuss what's in store for season two." "The second season... it's very different from season one." "[ELECTRICITY POWERS UP]" "(NARRATOR):" "This is "Mr. Robot dec0d3d."" "And the Golden Globe goes to..." ""Mr. Robot." Yep." "(NARRATOR): "Mr. Robot" is the brainchild of creator Sam Esmail." ""Mr. Robot" is about this sort of modern society and the way we're so dependent on technology just to even socialize, so it's really about this guy who cannot connect, and the only way he does so is by hacking people." "(NARRATOR): "Mr. Robot" tells the story of Elliot Alderson." "By night, he's a socially withdrawn but gifted computer hacker who uses his skills to expose the misdeeds of others." "Wait, hold on." "I'll give you the money." "I'll pay you." "How much do you want?" "I'll pay you." "[SIREN WAILS]" "That's the part you were wrong about, Rohit." "I don't give a shit about money." "(NARRATOR):" "By day, he's a cybersecurity expert who's been recruited by the mysterious Mr. Robot to bring down the very corporation he was hired to protect." "What if you could take down one conglomerate, a conglomerate so deeply entrenched in the world's economy that "too big to fail"" "doesn't even come close to describing it?" "(NARRATOR):" "Together, with the hacker group fsociety, he succeeds in crippling the world's most powerful firm, setting in motion a global crisis beyond anyone's control." "Evil Corp, the people of the world who have been enslaved by you have been freed." "Your financial data has been destroyed." "(NARRATOR): "Mr. Robot" features a stellar ensemble cast led by the Critics' Choice Award winner for Best Actor," "Rami Malek." "Getting in Elliot's head, as odd as it seems, is, you know, something I really enjoy, you know, to go into his psychosis, what he's suffering through, the good in him, the bad, the ugly." "All of it is... it's something that consumes me." "(NARRATOR):" "Christian Slater, winner of the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor, plays Mr. Robot." "The relationship between Mr. Robot and Elliot... you know, this character, Mr. Robot, comes into his life and lures him into his world to become part of this team of people that are really looking to change society." "I tried to protect you, son, but they caught up to us." "What are you talking about?" "That's Darlene and Angela." "Elliot, who are you talking to?" "What do you mean?" "I'm talking to... (NARRATOR):" "This dark and edgy series, with its cinematic style and unpredictable plotlines, has struck a chord with viewers." "The world of hacking really is sort of an obscure world to the general population, so the fact that we broke out in any way like that is incredibly shocking." "(NARRATOR):" "Kate Coyne, executive editor at "People,"" "and Emily Yoshida, entertainment editor at "The Verge,"" "have closely followed "Mr. Robot's" rise to prominence in pop culture." "I think "Mr. Robot" made such an impression because of the timeliness." "It's inspired big debates that went beyond the events of the show." "I think that's always the sign of a show that is meaningful for the time in which it's being made." "The things that concern us, the big ideas that concern us at any given era..." "I think "Mr. Robot" really taps into that." "This is very much a show that could only exist in a post-WikiLeaks world." "You know, everybody, I think, probably suspects that, on some level, what they're doing is being watched or recorded." "When a cry goes up about the NSA or about Edward Snowden or something, a lot of people practically just shrug, like," ""Yeah, yeah, probably... you're probably listening to my cell calls."" "That's crazy, but that's the state that we're in now." "Anybody can hack into anything." "His was the easiest to hack." "Password was 123456Seven." "I witnessed his first "I love you"" "with Angela over Gchat." "Then I witnessed the first of many infidelities with Stella B." "Everything about us is all digital." "It's all in a cloud." "Now you can go get somebody's social security, fingerprints, images, everything." "You can literally take over their entire life." "That's frightening." "It's not like they're talking about it in science-fiction terms." "What they're tackling is something that's actually currently, right now happening." "(NARRATOR):" "Coming up on "Mr. Robot dec0d3d,"" "we'll take a deeper look at the rise of hacking culture..." "There's always been a little bit of wish fulfillment to hacker stories in that they are the sort of modern superheroes." "(NARRATOR):" "And learn how a Hollywood movie alerted a president to the dangers of cybersecurity." "(NARRATOR):" "Plus, we'll also discuss what's in store for season two." "But first, a word from our corporate overlords!" "Come on, kid." "We got big things in store." "Big things." "(NARRATOR): "Mr. Robot's" authentic portrayal of computer hacking has alerted us to the real-world dangers we all face." "Now we'll find out just how much we're at risk." "This is "Mr. Robot dec0d3d."" "How about Global Thermonuclear War?" "(NARRATOR):" "In 1983, the movie "WarGames"" "forever changed the way we would look at hacking." "Ronald Reagan was apparently shown the movie "WarGames,"" "and he commissioned, you know, a study as to:" "Is this actually possible?" "And everybody was expecting the answer was," ""No, you can't start, you know, a global thermonuclear war" ""just by dialing up, you know, a computer accidentally and getting it to talk to you."" "And unfortunately, the answer came back going," ""Well, um, this is a little more possible than we thought."" "(NARRATOR): "WarGames" also spawned a whole new generation of hackers." "I mean, I remember being a kid and watching Matthew Broderick do all that and going, "That's really cool." "That's really awesome," you know?" "And, by the way, he saved the world." "It's the first time that you saw Hollywood trying to depict what people could do with computers that went beyond just playing games and sending emails and got me even more excited in computers and computer hacking." "(NARRATOR):" "What is hacking?" "Who hacks?" "How and why is it executed?" "To get the answers, we went to world-renowned specialists in the field of cybersecurity and to the foremost experts on the subject, the hackers themselves." "Everybody has a different answer on what a hacker is or what is a hack, but for me, it comes down to making technology do stuff it was never meant to do." "The show "Mr. Robot" I'm particular fond of because they point out how, oftentimes, it's very simplistic, the hacking mechanism." "Sometimes it's having physical access, so you can swap a SIM out in a phone." "Other times, it's social engineering." "It's not that they cracked some code or some encryption." "It's that they sent an email, and they misrepresented who they were, they... and got you to click on an attachment and run the code for them or that they called up on the phone and pretended that they were, you know, a technical person" "to get you to give information." "Hello?" "Hi, this is Sam from Bank of E security fraud department." "Unfortunately, I have to inform you that your account's been compromised." "What?" "What happened?" "First, before I can answer any questions," "I need to verify some information." "Are you still at 306 Hawthorne Avenue?" "Yes, apartment 2C." "Great, and your security question, favorite baseball team." "Um, Yankees." "I don't remember this being a security question." "And lastly, your pet's name." "Um, Flipper." "Uh, who am I speaking to?" "Can I get your name and numb..." "With those details plus a dictionary brute-force attack, it'll take my program maybe two minutes to crack his password." "The last five, ten years, hacking has become like a new superpower that hasn't been invented, and because of everyone's reliance on technology and all your personal information being online, this power just sort of came about." "Hacking her was simple." "Her password:" "Dylan 2791." "Favorite artist and the year in which she was born, backwards." "People are horrible at being sources of randomness, so, you know, somebody might think," ""Oh, I used my dog's name, my baby's name, and the birth... and the birth date."" "That's a horrible password." "It might seem complicated to you, but we know how you think because you're a human, and humans are predictable." "This doesn't make sense." "Did he know I was gonna hack him?" "Did he let me?" "I'm gonna need to wipe everything." ""Hackers," you know, it used to be a nasty word." "It was, like, synonymous with "criminal,"" "but now they're part of the system." "(NARRATOR):" "But not all hackers are cut from the same cloth." "So a white hat hacker is one who would be hired by a corporation to hack their systems for the sole purpose of finding the flaws, whereas black hat... there's no permission whatsoever, and it's usually for malicious purposes." "And then there's the middle ground, which is grey hat." "Hello, Evil Corp. We are fsociety." "Over the years, we've been watching you:" "your financial abuse of the poor, your corruption of governments, your cover-ups of the murder of innocent ordinary citizens all for the sake of profit." "This is why we at fsociety have decided you must die." "I would characterize the members of fsociety as probably falling into that grey area because, while their intentions are good, they are doing highly illegal things." "The entire company's gonna be reeling from all the data dumps we've got in store for them, and, man, do we have some goodies." "Some good old-fashioned executive racism, sexism, fascism." "Trust me... we are gonna "ism" so much all over them, they won't be able to see straight." "(NARRATOR):" "Unlike their motives, there are many psychological traits that hackers share." "Elliot, he's probably depicted more accurate than I've seen in a long time, not just for the technical capabilities and how it is but the actual, like, psychological profile." "He's got that young hacker vibe." "And then his involvement in how he feels about society and that counter culture I think is very accurate." "I hate when I can't hold in my loneliness." "This crying's been happening too often, every other week now." "What do normal people do when they get this sad?" "He's such a complicated character." "He's full of contradictions." "He hates what society has become, but he also wants to save it." "He looks down on the people that he cares about, but then he also protects them." "His abandonment issues are actually something that I believe personally and I've seen in my work." "I think it is a big motivator on why people get into hacking." "Elliot's, you know, trapped in a bubble." "He's very lonely." "He doesn't know how to connect with people, so he hacks into their lives." "I think all of us to a certain degree can connect with that type of loneliness, and the need to maybe not be so robotic and have more of a human connection with one another." "I like you, bro, and I want you to like me too." "Am I crazy not to like this guy?" "Amongst some of his Facebook likes are George W. Bush's "Decision Points,"" ""Transformers 2:" "Revenge of the Fallen,"" "and the music of Josh Groban." "Must I really justify myself any further?" "When you're socially awkward, or you're worried about people judging you, you have all these anxieties that just aren't there when you're in front of a computer." "It's a lot harder to talk to people than it is to deal with a piece of software." "(NARRATOR):" "But when hackers do come together and groups are formed, leaders emerge." "You want to talk about reality?" "We haven't lived in anything remotely close to it since the turn of the century." "We turned it off, took out the batteries, snacked on a bag of GMOs while we tossed the remnants in the ever-expanding dumpster of the human condition." "We live in branded houses, trademarked by corporations, built on bipolar numbers." "In every hacker group there's this leader that, online they're quiet, they're hidden in the background, but when you meet them they're actually really extroverted and, like, passionate and principled." "I didn't want to hurt you, Romero." "I just wanted you to come back to the arcade with me so we could change the world together." "(NARRATOR):" "It is this instigator mentality that forms the basis of Mr. Robot's character." "Do I think Elliot needs Mr. Robot?" "I think he's a vital element to Elliot's survival." "He is that darker side that will sometimes do things that Elliot otherwise would be incapable of doing." "(NARRATOR):" "Coming up, we'll explore the eerie ways" ""Mr. Robot" parallels the real world." "The Sony hack got a lot of notoriety." "The Ashley Madison hack got a lot of notoriety." "Our show is getting a lot of notoriety because of the real world connections." "(NARRATOR):" "Plus, we'll also discuss what's in store for season two." "We kind of, like, press the gas pedal down really hard." "Gotten to know my stunt double more this season, so that might say something." "(NARRATOR):" "This is "Mr. Robot dec0d3d."" "(NARRATOR): "Mr. Robot's" authentic portrayal of computer hacking has alerted us to the real-world dangers we all face." "Now we'll find out just how much we're at risk." "This is "Mr. Robot dec0d3d."" "This kid should not be allowed to do what he did." "He hacked into my private life." "And then those Ashley Madison dumps happened." "My wife found out about everything anyway." "She left me." "(NARRATOR):" "In a year in which we've seen a record number of cyber attacks," ""Mr. Robot's" timeliness is almost uncanny." "I don't know that a TV show can necessarily predict the future, but certainly, they can hold a mirror up to the direction in which we're headed." "(NARRATOR):" "And while some storylines are ripped from the headlines, other times, "Mr. Robot" was there first." "There were two instances on "Mr. Robot"" "where something incredibly prophetic happened on the show weeks away from it happening in real life." "The Ashley Madison hacks were one." "You know, one of the escorts was 15." "And then the other one was the shooting of the news anchor in Virginia that happened so close to a similar event happening on "Mr. Robot"" "that the finale had to be delayed a week just out of sensitivity." "These aren't just isolated incidences that exist in a bubble." "These are things that are symptoms of larger things going on in our society." "Colby either used hacking groups or worked in conjunction with them." "I think a lot of "Mr. Robot" and the hacks in it kind of reflect reality." "It's happening, it's happening, it's happening, it's happening." "The hacks that are happening every week in the real world are stranger than fiction almost." "[DRAMATIC MUSIC]" "Power plants hacked, a movie not released because North Korea was upset, some of the biggest retailers in the world lose millions and millions worth of credit cards or data, hospitals shut down because all their files got encrypted" "by someone trying to get ransom out of them." "These all sound like the storylines of a TV show about hacking, but it's actually happening now." ""Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson" ""released a statement today stating that these groups" ""lack the resources and knowledge of the USL to successfully mount an attack," end quote." "There are some brilliant people out there, both on the offense and defensive side of things that can do amazing things with computers." "You got this, you got this, you got this." "And it's both inspiring and kind of scary sometimes to see that." "[CELL PHONE BUZZING]" "I, uh..." "I have to go." "I'm sorry." "I need to go to my office." "What'd you do?" "I spoofed a text from her husband." "So, yeah, probably the most alarming hack we've seen was the Sony hack where not only, you know, all of these email archives were compromised, but also it was released on a schedule of," "you know, every week we're gonna have another one of these, until you meet with our demands." "(NARRATOR):" "Another parallel between "Mr. Robot"" "and the real world can be seen in fsociety's threatened use of a data dump, a scenario inspired by the Sony hack." "They hit the mother lode during the breach, potentially terabytes worth of email and files." "They're threatening to dump everything." "They released the video this morning." "Meet our demands and we will consider not destroying you." "Consider yourself warned." "This is, you know, a way to hold power accountable." "It can also be used to harass and to silence and really as an instrument of fear." "(NARRATOR):" "In an age where everyone is connected, and privacy is becoming harder to protect," ""Mr. Robot" has shined a light on the risks and the realities we all face every day." "The writers have tapped into the paranoia that we all now feel, that all of our information is just ripe for the taking." "He got into my system, and he wants me to the put the CD on one of the computers at work." "Why does he want to do that?" "I don't know, Stella." "He didn't give me a full explanation." "So he's got naked pics of me?" "Is that the only thing you're seriously taking away from this conversation?" "[SIGHS]" "Hey, babe." ""Mr. Robot" is absolutely showing everyone that we are living in a society right now in which secrets just don't exist." "You maybe can't trust many people at all." "I know she went through a divorce four years ago." "I know she was devastated by it and has been dating losers on eHarmony ever since." "The more accessible we make ourselves, the more people are probably going to be able to take advantage of that." "By the end of watching season one of "Mr. Robot,"" "anyone who previously just typed away on a computer, you're probably going about those transactions now with just a little more caution, a little bit more of a realization that that little lock symbol doesn't mean a whole lot." "[CELL PHONE BUZZING]" "(NARRATOR):" "Our personal information, our very identity, is accessible to anyone, any time, and we look to the government to protect us from criminal activity, but a recent case between Apple and the FBI, who are trying to unlock a terrorist's cell phone," "brings up a gray area." "Should the government be given access to your personal devices?" "Telecommunications companies have been cooperating with law enforcement and intelligence agencies for nearly a century." "And so you have the FBI saying" ""Oh, we can't hack into your iPhone." "We need your help in doing it."" "And Apple is saying, "Our stuff is so secure, it's a danger to everybody if we help you out on this."" "NSA and the intelligence community in general is focused on getting intelligence wherever it can, by any means possible, so while they may be intending to target someone associated with a foreign government, or someone that they suspect of terrorism," "they're collecting your communications to do so." "You would ask any person on the street," ""Should the government be able to hack into a phone to investigate a terrorism suspect?"" "and everybody would say yes." "And then, you ask them, "Well, should they be able to hack into your phone?" and everybody would say no." "We have to look really, really hard at the kind of slippery slopes that we're building, as far as how much access the government or any other corporation has into our data." "Any analyst at any time can target anyone, from you or your accountant to a federal judge to even the president, if I had a personal email." "Ben Franklin said it best:" ""Those who give up liberty for security will have neither."" "(NARRATOR):" "Coming up: from the tech to the techniques, see how "Mr. Robot" is as real as it gets." "Every single hack that we show on the show is possible." "(NARRATOR):" "Plus, we'll show you what's in store for season two." "Our infinite loop of insanity." "(NARRATOR):" "This is "Mr. Robot dec0d3d."" "(NARRATOR): "Mr. Robot's" authentic portrayal of computer hacking has alerted us to the real-world dangers we all face." "Now we'll find out just how much we're at risk." "This is "Mr. Robot dec0d3d."" "Maybe we should consider rehab." "I'm not a junkie." "Then you'll need to prove it to me." "Submit to a bi-monthly drug test, voluntarily." "That's the only way that I'll recommend your release." "This is William Highsmith." "He's not only the head of the IT department here, he's also an idiot." "He uses useless virus scans, dated servers, and security software that runs on Windows 98." "One of the reasons why I made this place my primary care facility." "I can make my health records look like every other obedient zombie out there." "(NARRATOR): "Mr. Robot's" popularity with many of its most fervent fans can largely be attributed to its realistic portrayal of computer technology." "That's the purview of technical consultant Kor Adana." "I'm involved in every aspect of all the tech that you see on the show." "I'm involved in pitching the ideas of the hacks that we see fsociety being a part of." "It's not your typical tech consulting gig." "Too many movies or TV shows try to make hacking just magic, and they don't explain it." "It's just something that you can't understand, and because of that, it's some superpower." "I think one of the greatest compliments we can get is just how realistic and authentic the show actually portrays what's really going on out there." "One of the things that's so great about the show is that you'll actually learn a few things." "This is bad, worst DDoS attack I've ever seen." "DDoS attacks are a bunch of hackers getting together to overload a system to take it down for, you know, a temporary amount of time." "It's a flood of traffic." "We're sending signals over wires, and if you have too many signals at the same time, the real signal can't get through." "Tried to reboot the servers, but they're not coming back up." "Dude, someone is straight up finger blasting their entire network right now." "I've learned quite a bit, maybe too much." "It's kind of scary, mm, what I'm capable of these days." "(NARRATOR):" "For the creators and fans alike, there's an appreciation that the realism lies in the details." "People are screen-capturing the images on the computer screens, and looking at them to see if they're real." "And they are real, and that takes a lot of time." "One screenshot that was shown, I think, for less than a second took somebody over ten hours of work to make that an authentic load-up sequence." "All of the screens are designed, essentially, by me, and I work with animators to achieve those and make sure that they're technically accurate." "I think details like that really enriches and deepens the world." "It makes the show this almost alternate reality that's not too detached from our own." "(NARRATOR):" "More than just imagery," ""Mr. Robot's" realism extends to the schemes and methods that are currently in use by the hacking community." "Their ability to infiltrate and alter a physical environment was illustrated by the Steel Mountain hack, a scenario that closely paralleled one of history's most famous cyber attacks, Stuxnet." "The US and Israel had a joint operation where they created an amazingly complex program that hacked into the computers controlling the speed with which centrifuges were spinning in the plant in Iran that was enriching uranium." "And about half of Iran's centrifuges were destroyed." "It probably slowed down their nuclear program by three years." "To think about the steps that are required to plan that and then causing kinetic damage, is incredible." "He wants to hack Steel Mountain's climate control system, raise the facility's heat high enough to destroy all the tapes." "And you think sticking this behind the thermostat will do all that?" "From a authenticity standpoint, if you wanted to hack a major corporation, they would have off-site tape backups at a location like Steel Mountain." "There." "Deep in the Adirondacks." "In 145-plus acre former limestone mine." "3-ton steel gates, 24/7 armed guards, closed circuit cameras, NOC staffing." "A fair amount of the plots and techniques and the hacks and the approaches in "Mr. Robot"" "are actually plausible." "The reason they're plausible:" "it's 90% preparation and only 10% execution." "There's a fair amount of understanding how the other systems and the targets that you're focusing on work, and then having your, you know, system and your hack ready so that you can execute it, you know, when the time is right." "All we need is one security flaw." "Look at this place, man." "It was built not to have any." "I see about... six walking around." "(NARRATOR):" "Social engineering is one example of a real-world hacking method, and "Mr. Robot" illustrates it to perfection." "The social engineering component of hacking, I think, is one of the most important aspects of it." "Taking advantage of that human element of security." "Bill Harper is our first exploit." "He isn't gonna give the search much scrutiny." "He'll get us to Level 1, but Bill is not gonna be able to get us to Level 2." "And we need to get to Level 2." "You're gonna ask to speak to his supervisor, Wendy." "She'll get us to exactly where we need to be." "Then we'll be able to get rid of her from the van." "After that, you connect the Raspberry Pi to the climate control system, and Bob's your uncle." "It doesn't matter how hardened your system is, how great your security policies are, what kind of software you have on your system." "There's always gonna be a human that has access to information that's important." "And you can always find a way to manipulate that person." "People are all just people, right?" "When it gets down to it, everyone's the same." "They love something." "They want something." "They fear something." "Specifics help, but specifics don't change the way that everyone is vulnerable." "It just changes the way that we access those vulnerabilities." "Great example of this is" "Elliot impersonating a multi-million-dollar CEO to get through the door." "I really think you should look me up." "It... it just doesn't work like that." "I'm sorry, sir." "You impersonate someone that is in need of some kind of help or assistance, most of the time, they'll want to help you." "Mr. Sepiol?" "Mr. Sepiol!" "I have some good news." "And that's why Bill Harper is a perfect exploit, desperate enough for the business to break protocol and let me in." "Lonely enough to break." "They won't even know that they're giving you some kind of information that will help you hack their system later." "But it happens all the time." "(NARRATOR):" "Coming up on "Mr. Robot dec0d3d,"" "we delve into the ethics of hacktivism." "If you feel that there is injustice, sometimes the only way to deal with it is to out-monster the monster." "(NARRATOR):" "Plus, we'll also discuss what's in store for season two." "This is "Mr. Robot dec0d3d."" "(NARRATOR): "Mr. Robot's" authentic portrayal of computer hacking has alerted us to the real-world dangers we all face." "Now, we'll find out just how much we're at risk." "This is "Mr. Robot dec0d3d."" "You're blowing up a gas pipeline." "The world is a dangerous place, Elliot." "Not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing." "This is war." "People will die." "C'est la mort." "I'm not killing anyone." "[TENSE MUSIC]" "Tell me one thing, Elliot." "Are you a one or a zero?" "That's the question you have to ask yourself." "Are you a yes or a no?" "Are you gonna act or not?" "Hacktivism is the act of compromising a computer system or a network with a political agenda in mind." "(NARRATOR):" "One of the reasons for "Mr. Robot's" huge success is that it speaks to the current generation's distrust of our corporate culture and to their frustration with the status quo." "But is taking matters into our own hands ever justified?" "In many cases, hacktivism takes the form of anti-establishment points of view." "The governments of the world and their corporate masters do not want us to speak." "Why?" "Because we unlock truths." "We expose villains." "If you have any interest in waking from your slumber and retrieving lost, damaged, or stolen memory, we are here for you." "We have your back." "We are fsociety." "A lot of fsociety and the mask is obviously evocative of Anonymous and the Guy Fawkes mask that a lot of people in Anonymous started to wear back when they had their campaign against the Church of Scientology." "Their declaration of war on Scientology definitely served as an inspiration for some of the content that you see on "Mr. Robot."" "Corporate greed is a trickle-down desire that reaches even the bottom of the food chain." "And for what?" "Wealth?" "Power?" "What the shit?" "It's a pathetic fable, and you, Allsafe, are a defender of..." "Holy shit. fsociety knows us." "But your sweet dream is over and your nightmare is about to begin." "Gideon Goddard, you are a lackey to your corporate overlords..." "Someone shut this off." "Serving them, slave to master." "We are exposing your role to your world, and the world is very angry." "I have a very anti-corporate, anti-establishment spirit in me, and as much as I appreciate Occupy Wall Street," "I think as an adult I want to use that anger to actually do something constructive and positive." "And I think, like, for example, the Arab Spring is a good example where they really kind of got empowered through social media, actually, through technology, and really made change." "[ALL CHANTING]" "The Arab Spring is a really good example of security in action." "If you're an activist in Bahrain, you need your email, you need your Facebook account to be secure, because if the government, which controls all the Internet infrastructure, can get in, that's it, you're done." "They're gonna take... come to your house and put a bag over your head and no one will ever see you again." "Now whatever it is you think you're doing freeing the world, freeing the masses, the guys I work for, they ain't motivated by" ""Kumbaya" shit like that." "Right and wrong is relative, and it comes down to your own ideology, your own moral compass, and whether or not you feel passionate enough about that to act on it." "How come I'm not in trouble?" "[LAUGHS SOFTLY]" "Even though what you did was wrong, you're still a good kid." "And that guy was a prick." "Sometimes that matters more." "I think the reason it thematically resonates with people when you're watching a show like "Mr. Robot,"" "if the antagonist is strong enough or if you feel that there is injustice coming from the antagonist, if there's an injustice in the world... sometimes the only way to deal with it is to out-monster the monster." "Fernando Vera, Shayla's supplier and one of the worst human beings I've ever hacked." "He does all his drug transactions through emails, IMs, Twitter." "He can't be allowed to exist anymore." "When you break down motivations of hackers, it's money, ideology, coercion, ego, or revenge, and sometimes criss and cross." "(NARRATOR):" "In "Mr. Robot,"" "Elliot's ideology is founded on his desire to avenge his father's death." "This isn't even about my revolution." "This is more than that for you." "This is about how those bastards slowly killed your father and how you wished he'd done something about it, but he didn't because he was a zero, just like you're being right now." "It's just a basic question of, you know, when does the good outweigh the bad and vice versa?" "You know, the very massive ethical questions that this show will pose." "We hope that you will forge a better world, a world that belongs to us again!" "[ALL CHEERING]" "We'll see if Elliot and everybody in fsociety... are saving the world or destroying it." "(NARRATOR):" "Coming up, could a small group of hackers actually change the world overnight?" "It's not a fantasy." "It's not science fiction." "(NARRATOR):" "Plus, we'll show you what's in store for season two." "Amen, amen, amen!" "(NARRATOR):" "This is "Mr. Robot dec0d3d."" "Evil Corp, you have been owned." "We at fsociety will smile as we watch you and your dark soul die." "[DRAMATIC MUSIC]" "(NARRATOR):" "USA Network's "Mr. Robot" is groundbreaking television, with cutting edge storylines, detailed world building, and uncanny parallels to current events." "Certainly a subject matter that has become more and more relevant as..." "as the year has gone on." "Markets in Asia and Europe are tumbling dramatically." "Numerous governments in the European Union are now in a free-for-all." "So this is what our evolution" "Looks like: a simple program, a worm that can make data unreadable." "Is that really all it takes to kill the world?" "(NARRATOR):" "But could the fsociety hack portrayed in the show actually happen?" "What would the fallout of such a hack look like?" "So we have plenty of companies that kind of fall into that" ""too big to fail" moniker." "It's kind of scary to think about what the impact of a destructive hack against them could have on... on society." "You could wreck large sectors of the power grid." "You could take down a whole bank." "You could do a lot of damage." "There are some key vulnerabilities within our national infrastructure." "People could actually take the entire Internet down." "A lone hacker really can do immense damage, or they can do immense good." "It's just all in the motivation." "I think it'd be possible." "Are there ramifications to that?" "Of course." "Are there ramifications to that that fsociety and Elliot didn't even think of?" "Definitely." "And we're gonna get into that in season two." "There's gonna be, I bet, a lot of people coming for them." "You know, law enforcement's gonna be coming in season two." "It has to." "(NARRATOR):" "Season two of "Mr. Robot" will go deeper into this amazing world, as the characters deal with the repercussions of the Evil Corp hack." "So we come back in season two and the hack has gone through and kind of destroyed the world." "The FBI announced today, and we can confirm that fsociety engaged in this attack." "Now that Elliot knows who Mr. Robot is, it's very different from last year." "What he's trying to do at all costs is to remove him from his world." "In the second season, the story really picks up and... and moves forward." "You know, we set up all the characters, and now really in the second season we're really kind of letting all those characters run wild." "We're really going into an ensemble sort of version of the show." "We're in four or five different worlds at the same time." "Just watching that struggle and seeing people at the end of their rope still persevere and continue to fight, even though their back's against the wall." "[DRAMATIC MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "In the second season, all the characters have sort of evolved." "The world is very different." "Expect to be a little surprised because we're going down a very different direction than the road we went down in season one." "And Sam has got it really mapped out." "When I was reading these scripts, and I was just saying, "Oh, my God."" "There's these clues that you kind of strand together." "I mean, we were like, Reddit people discussing with each other what we thought would happen." "He comes up with some crazy stuff." "♪ ♪" "I don't know what I'm supposed to do." "I'll tell you exactly what you're gonna do." "You're gonna start listening to us." "The world is a better place because of what we did, Elliot, and you're gonna realize that one way or another." "Now here's what I need you to do now." "So what has "Mr. Robot" taught us?" "Working with the tech advisor has got me to change the way" "I conduct myself." "Someone actually asked me the other day if I wanted to hack them, could I?" "Unfortunately, the answer was no, and I really wish it was yes." "I tend to be paranoid about my own information." "My drives, my phone." "The microphone you have on your computer can be accessed." "The camera, as much as people don't think it can be accessed, it can." "I tell other people to tape the camera on their laptop." "Oh, yeah, put the piece of tape on your laptop." "Absolutely a must." "I was literally actually about to get tape and do that." "That's great." "I've infected my paranoia with everyone."