Orwell takes place in a country called the Nation, led by a modern-day authoritarian government known as The Party in the capital of Bonton. In 2012, the Party passed the Safety Bill, a law expanding the government's ability to spy on its citizens in the name of national security. As part of the bill, the Ministry of Security, led by Secretary of Security Catherine Delacroix, commissioned a covert surveillance system codenamed Demiurge (later renamed Orwell).

Orwell allows investigations into the private communications of people of interest, but doesn't allow any one person full access. Instead, Orwell's operation is run by two groups; Investigators, persons outside of the Nation working for the government who search through the communication of target persons and upload items of interest (represented as "datachunks"), and Advisors, people inside of the Nation who use the received datachunks to determine the course of action and to recommend actions to the authorities.

The player takes the role of an Orwell investigator who has just been hired and is about to begin training