Debunking Zero Day: What a Real Cyber 9/11 Might Look Like

Netflix’s new miniseries Zero Day envisions a catastrophic cyberattack on the U.S., disrupting power grids, transportation, communications, and even hospital life-support systems. In the show’s fictional scenario, subways crash, planes go down, and mobile networks display an ominous hacker message before everything abruptly comes back online—leaving mass casualties in its wake.

While the series aims to highlight cybersecurity threats, experts argue its depiction is more fiction than fact.

What Zero Day Gets Right

The show incorporates real cybersecurity concepts like zero-day vulnerabilities, backdoors, and critical infrastructure risks. J. Stephen Kowski, Field CTO at SlashNext, notes that past cyber incidents—such as the Colonial Pipeline hack in 2021 and the 2024 software glitch that grounded thousands of flights—demonstrate real vulnerabilities in national security. He also praises Zero Day’s focus on smartphone-based attacks, acknowledging that cybercriminals increasingly exploit mobile devices using AI-driven tactics.

Where Zero Day Falls Short

However, cybersecurity experts argue that Zero Day exaggerates the feasibility of a perfectly synchronized, nationwide cyberattack.

Ilia Sotnikov, a security strategist at Netwrix, critiques the show’s portrayal of a Mark Zuckerberg-like tech mogul deploying an EternalBlue-style exploit via a SolarWinds-type software update. The idea that malware could seamlessly spread from mobile phones to diverse industrial systems via Bluetooth and USB connections is highly unrealistic. Different companies and infrastructure components use unique technologies with varying security defenses, making a universal exploit unlikely.

Andrew Ginter, VP of Industrial Security at Waterfall Security Solutions, emphasizes that every new system added to an attack increases cost, complexity, and the risk of early detection. He argues that large-scale cyberattacks take significant time to execute, making a simultaneous takedown of multiple industries nearly impossible.

What a Real Zero-Day Attack Could Look Like

Experts suggest that instead of attacking every sector at once, a more plausible cyberattack would target a single, high-impact point of failure—such as air traffic control, water treatment facilities, or power plants. A well-executed attack on one of these could cause widespread disruption without requiring an impossibly complex operation.

Ginter points to the increasing integration of critical infrastructure with vendor-managed cloud systems as a potential risk. If a nation-state adversary compromised a major infrastructure vendor, they could access multiple clients’ networks simultaneously. However, even this approach has limits, as safety systems in critical industries are typically air-gapped from the cloud, making them difficult to breach remotely.

The Bottom Line

While Zero Day presents an engaging, high-stakes cyber thriller, its doomsday scenario stretches beyond credibility. A real cyber 9/11 would likely be more targeted, leveraging vulnerabilities in supply chains or vendor-managed systems rather than an all-encompassing digital apocalypse. Fortunately, current safeguards and the sheer diversity of infrastructure defenses make such an attack unlikely—at least for now.