Computer hacking started off innocently enough. Teenage boys, bored with life in the outer suburbs, exploring a new technology. Hacking credit cards and buying flowers, cans of coke and concert tickets for their girlfriends. They were known by their online handles. In this episode, we meet Optimus Prime, Bit Mapper and Optic Surfer, hackers who were showing authorities what was possible with these new home appliances. It caught police off guard to say the least, there were no hacking laws and their first encounter with a computer hacker didn’t go well. 

Introducing Motherlode, a Ranieri and Co. production. The gripping story about the birth of computer hacking from an unlikely centre - Melbourne, Australia. It was here teenage boys, and they were mostly boys, hacked into some of the biggest organisations in the world. It’s also where a young hacker, Julian Assange, cut his teeth on computers and went on to develop Wikileaks, the most disruptive website the world has seen. But Wikileaks didn’t just spring up out of nowhere. It was 20 years in the making. Motherlode reveals the technological and political motivations behind it.