Cyber war on the airwaves?

This “new Cold War” business is clearly getting serious.

Fresh from the hotly contested claim that Vladimir Putin’s IT henchmen tried to rig the US election in Donald Trump’s favour, the BBC is now investigating whether Russian hackers were responsible for leaking online the final episode of popular Sunday night drama Sherlock.

When an enemy’s tentacles find their way into your light entertainment infrastructure, you know you’ve got a battle on your hands.

Apparently, the “season finale” – or last one in the series, if you don’t speak like a US TV executive – was illegally put on the internet on Saturday, a day before it was due to air on BBC1.

Reports say the leaked version was dubbed in Russian and featured a continuity announcement from the Russian state-owned Channel One. There’s nothing like covering your tracks, unless the culprits were clumsily attempting to blame it on the evil Ruskies (as they were known in Cold War One).

Still, a spoiler is hardly the Cuban Missile Crisis. If Putin was really serious, he’d surely have ordered the leaking of the English language version, rather than an episode where Benedict Cumberbatch sounds like a Cossack fighter.

If any Sherlock fans are happy to put up with Russian dialogue, just so they can watch their favourite programme a day earlier, good luck to them. While I’m sure a handful of bilingual viewers found it very rewarding, the rest of us got through the weekend blissfully unaware.

But apparently this is no laughing matter. According to Sky News: “If proven true, it could be another episode on the ongoing cyber war between Russia and the West.”

If they start messing with Bake Off next, we’ll know we’ve got trouble.