Siobhan Finneran plays DI Liz Nyles, a veteran of the UK's witness protection programme whose affair with colleague DI Richard Bewley becomes leverage for enemies inside her own squad. The six-part ITV drama, written by Australian screenwriter Kris Mrksa, opens with a breach that leaves a protected family exposed and Nyles scrambling to discover whether the leak came from her bed or her briefing room.
Mrksa built the scripts from interviews with a 30-year Metropolitan Police witness-protection veteran who handled informants, war criminals and terrorists, and the detail shows: safe houses in Crosby, midnight moves across Runcorn, and the bureaucratic terror of a single misfiled form. Katherine Kelly arrives as DCI Hannah Wheatley, the boss who trusts Nyles least, while Nadine Marshall's DCI Amanda Kelman supplies the internal affairs pressure that keeps every corridor conversation double-edged.
Filmed summer 2023 across Merseyside locations, the series landed on BritBox in North America December 2024 before ITV1 and ITVX released it in March 2025. ITV cancelled Protection after one season.
Production Details
ITV1 / 1 Season / 6 Episodes / 2024 - Present
Created by: Kris Mrksa
Producer(s): Rebecca Davies
Main Cast
Siobhan Finneran as DI Liz Nyles
Andrew Knott as DI Richard Bewley
Alec Newman as Edward Crowther
Barry Ward as DS Paul Brandice
Katherine Kelly as DCI Hannah Wheatley
David Hayman as Sid Nyles
Jodie Price as Jasmine Nyles
Nadine Marshall as DCI Amanda Kelman
Chaneil Kular as DS Raj Kholi
Akiya Henry as DS Sue Beardsley
Tom Christian as DI Tommy Jardine
Tom Christian as DI Tommy Jardine
