MOST WANTED: TEEN HACKER premieres on HBO Max on September 5, 2025. The four-part Max Original follows Finnish hacker Julius Kivimäki, now known as Aleksanteri Kivimäki, whose activity drew intense attention from law enforcement across several countries.
The series tracks headline events tied to his name, including a global PlayStation outage, an emergency landing of a U.S. passenger plane, and a series of swatting incidents that reached the family of an FBI agent, according to Warner Bros. Interviews feature FBI personnel, cybercrime reporters, security researchers, victims, and Kivimäki himself.
How to watch MOST WANTED: TEEN HACKER
MOST WANTED: TEEN HACKER docuseries consists of four episodes. Each part covers a distinct chapter in the case, from early exploits to the international pursuit and court outcomes. Release pattern: one episode each Friday in September, starting September 5.
Availability spans the U.S., Europe, Latin America, Australia, and Southeast Asia, positioned as a Max Original release. Streaming is through the HBO Max app and the website.
An HBO Max subscription is required to watch the show. The subscription starts at $9.99 per month (Basic with ads). The Standard plan costs $16.99 per month, and the Premium plan costs $20.99 per month.
Release time by region:
About MOST WANTED: TEEN HACKER
Directed by Finnish filmmaker Sami Kieksi and co-written with Joni Soila, the series uses interviews, archives, and staged reconstructions to set out the story beat by beat. Production is by Aller Studios for HBO Max.
Sami Kieksi, director, said in a press release:
“This is a story that could not be more topical. The consequences of cybercrime can be very serious and substantial. I hope that the documentary series provokes discussion about cyber security and how seriously it should be taken. It has been an honor to have such world-renowned, esteemed information security experts and journalists, such as Allison Nixon, Brian Krebs, Joe Tidy and Mikko Hyppönen on board. Their well-versed insights bring an in-depth, international perspective to the series.”
Case details covered in the series match major incidents previously reported by mainstream outlets. These include the 2014 holiday DDoS that knocked PlayStation services offline and the bomb threat that led to an emergency landing of an American Airlines flight linked to a former Sony executive’s travel, according to KrebsOnSecurity and Variety. The project also addresses swatting campaigns that targeted private homes, including the family of a U.S. federal agent.

The narrative then moves to later events in Finland tied to the breach and extortion of the Vastaamo psychotherapy center, in which tens of thousands of patient records were leaked and patients were blackmailed, leading to charges and a conviction.
Kivimäki received a multi-year prison sentence in 2024, according to KrebsOnSecurity. The series includes accounts from investigators and victims who describe both the online intrusions and their real-world fallout, per the Warner Bros. Discovery press release.
Another thread in the program shows the investigative trail. Studio notes reference FBI efforts that located the teenage suspect at a Las Vegas casino during an earlier phase of the case. Interviews with reporters Allison Nixon, Brian Krebs, Joe Tidy, and researcher Mikko Hyppönen help unpack the technical tactics and the public impact.

The four-episode docuseries follows a clear timeline: teenage hacking and card theft, gaming-network attacks and airline threats, U.S. swatting incidents, and the later Vastaamo breach with extortion charges. It also covers sentencing and current custody details through interviews and court records, according to KrebsOnSecurity.
MOST WANTED: TEEN HACKER streams on HBO Max from September 5, 2025, with new episodes on Fridays throughout September.