This seems to have happened about a year before "The IT Crowd" episode "Smoke and Mirrors" aired.
In that episode Moss, one of the IT denizens, goes to a TV studio where he is mistakenly put on a news program and interviewed about a war.
I wonder if they're related...
That episode is indeed based on this event: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1111175/trivia/?ref_=tt_dyk_trv