North Korea Channel 4 drama AXED as TV company hacked in CYBER ATTACK

Opposite Number had been billed as a “bold and provocative” piece of TV, but has had to be pulled following the cyber attack.

The programme was due to be penned by Bridge of Spies writer and followed a British nuclear scientist taken prisoner by the tyrannical regime.

North Korea had branded the 10-part drama a “slanderous farce” and vowed to protect its crackpot dictator Kim Jong-un’s reputation.

It is claimed the hermit kingdom’s hackers then broke into TV company Mammoth Screen’s security system in an effort to wreak havoc, the BBC reported.

It is thought the attack was thwarted before any information was taken or serious damage done.

An executive told the BBC they were “running around with their hair on fire” after the cyber threat was uncovered.

And producers have now decided to abandon the programme, citing funding issues.

It is not the first time North Korea has unleashed a cyber attack on the entertainment industry.

In 2014, an attack on Sony Pictures was widely blamed on the secretive state.

It was thought to be in retaliation for the planned release of Seth Rogen and James Franco film The Interview, a comedy where Kim Jong-un was assassinated.

The latest news comes as tensions continue to rise even further with the rogue regime.

North Korea has vowed to bring “total destruction” to the US over its military drills on the peninsula.

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A state run newspaper urged Donald Trump to “think twice” over the exercises.

And the country’s Deputy UN Ambassador Kim In Ryong told the UN yesterday that “a nuclear war may break out any moment”.