My energy provider is pushing me to have a smart meter

Netexporter

Emily_Joy said:

oldernonethewiser said: What are folk worried aboout?

I personally worry about the fact that the smart meter collects information about how much and when the electricity/gas is used in my house. My partner and I, we are away from home often and for a long time (e.g. I was working abroad all September). The gas & electricity usage obviously indicate whether the house is occupied/lived in or not. I don't want this information to be collected and/or stored anywhere. 

Do you seriously think your friendly local burglar is going to be able to access the information?

Emily_Joy

ArbitraryRandom said:

Genuine question - do you have a smart phone... or even a mobile non-smart phone? 
Assuming you do, why is that okay but a smart meter not? 

I really don't get it. Yes, I do have a smart phone. It is not apple and it doesn't have google play, so most apps (including all banking apps) fail to run. My phone, I believe, doesn't give information as to whether the house is occupied or not to anyone.

ArbitraryRandom

Emily_Joy said:

ArbitraryRandom said:

Genuine question - do you have a smart phone... or even a mobile non-smart phone? 
Assuming you do, why is that okay but a smart meter not? 

I really don't get it. Yes, I do have a smart phone. It is not apple and it doesn't have google play, so most apps (including all banking apps) fail to run. My phone, I believe, doesn't give information as to whether the house is occupied or not to anyone.

I'm assuming your phone has a sim card? If so, whoever your service provider is (even if you're pay and go) will collect data about your location, such as your current location, recent locations visited, and areas of frequent travel - based on where your phone 'pings' a tower (every 30 mins or so).  

And that's not even considering when you make calls/send messages (recording who and when you contact and the duration of calls), and browser history (inc what websites you visit for how long and any links you click on). 

I don't think it's a concern, but if you are worried that someone can access secure data held on a dedicated closed system then... anyone who had access to that data (and cared enough to look) would be able to tell not only when your home was empty but exactly where you were and when you would be home again. 

https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2019/12/23/smartphone-location-data-can-be-used-to-identify-and-track-anyone/

ArbitraryRandom

Netexporter said:

Emily_Joy said:

oldernonethewiser said: What are folk worried aboout?

I personally worry about the fact that the smart meter collects information about how much and when the electricity/gas is used in my house. My partner and I, we are away from home often and for a long time (e.g. I was working abroad all September). The gas & electricity usage obviously indicate whether the house is occupied/lived in or not. I don't want this information to be collected and/or stored anywhere. 

Do you seriously think your friendly local burglar is going to be able to access the information?

I'd give it the same odds as a car exploding because someone shot the petrol tank. 

Spoonie_Turtle

ArbitraryRandom said:

Emily_Joy said:

ArbitraryRandom said:

Genuine question - do you have a smart phone... or even a mobile non-smart phone? 
Assuming you do, why is that okay but a smart meter not? 

I really don't get it. Yes, I do have a smart phone. It is not apple and it doesn't have google play, so most apps (including all banking apps) fail to run. My phone, I believe, doesn't give information as to whether the house is occupied or not to anyone.

I don't think it's a concern, but if you are worried that someone can access secure data held on a dedicated closed system then... anyone who had access to that data (and cared enough to look) would be able to tell not only when your home was empty but exactly where you were and when you would be home again. 

Following on from this, can someone more knowledgeable than me please explain the chain of transmission for smart meter data, who can see it / could see it if they really wanted, and where it's stored (and thus how secure it is)?

It might be helpful for any who genuinely are worried and don't have all the information to know whether they should be worried or not.

Although thinking about it logically, smart meter data is always sent after the fact anyway, so unless you have completely regular annual patterns with the house unoccupied during the same dates every year, knowing when the house was empty would be no help to someone wanting a potential target.  Not to mention unless they've already scoped out your house specifically, they would have no clue how easy your house would be to access or any security measures you have in place, whether there are any more concealed routes to approach, security lights, how densely populated your area is and the likelihood of neighbours seeing them.

I truly believe it would be much quicker and simpler for someone to watch our house to decide when to try their hand, than to attempt to access our smart meter data and use that.  So what if the house was unoccupied yesterday?  They have no idea whether we'll be back today or tomorrow or next week or … .

For Emily_Joy specifically, if you're often away for different lengths of time and no set pattern, it'd be extremely difficult for someone to infer anything from your usage patterns (if they could even access it in the first place).  The smart meter data does show how much energy is used and when, but it doesn't say what it's used by or for so unless you have a very light baseload or turn the heating off in winter (not advised, only turning it down) they wouldn't necessarily know whether one person is still there or not.  

ArbitraryRandom

Spoonie_Turtle said:

ArbitraryRandom said:

Emily_Joy said:

ArbitraryRandom said:

Genuine question - do you have a smart phone... or even a mobile non-smart phone? 
Assuming you do, why is that okay but a smart meter not? 

I really don't get it. Yes, I do have a smart phone. It is not apple and it doesn't have google play, so most apps (including all banking apps) fail to run. My phone, I believe, doesn't give information as to whether the house is occupied or not to anyone.

I don't think it's a concern, but if you are worried that someone can access secure data held on a dedicated closed system then... anyone who had access to that data (and cared enough to look) would be able to tell not only when your home was empty but exactly where you were and when you would be home again. 

Following on from this, can someone more knowledgeable than me please explain the chain of transmission for smart meter data, who can see it / could see it if they really wanted, and where it's stored (and thus how secure it is)?

I'm no expert/industry insider (my interest is in data/computing), but this might be a good starting point: https://www.smartdcc.co.uk/our-smart-network/protecting-data-on-the-smart-meter-network/

[Deleted User]

Following on from this, can someone more knowledgeable than me please explain the chain of transmission for smart meter data, who can see it / could see it if they really wanted, and where it's stored (and thus how secure it is)?

The key principle behind smart metering is one meter: one supplier. Only your nominated supplier has access to all your smart meter data. Your meter is protected by a bespoke security certificate which is part of the GCHQ level layered security built into the system design. 

Other DCC approved users can access certain elements of your data. For example, your DNO will receive high and low voltage reports and it has access to 30 minute voltage data stored within your meter.

Third parties such as BRIGHT and HUGO are permitted to access your usage data but only with the consumer’s express permission renewable each year. They do not get any index readings. 

The big mistakes that people make is that they think their meters are in permanent contact with the supplier, and that data is stored within the DCC. Neither is true. Your comms hub acts like a mobile phone. It sits idle on the network waiting for a call. For those on a 30 minute profile, the supplier provides a daily script to the DCC requesting meter data. The script is run by the DCC as network traffic permits. The DCC does not get access to this data: it is passthrough from the meters to the supplier. To connect to the DCC network, your supplier uses DCC-approved secure software known as an Adapter.

The supplier gets a daily data return from each smart meter showing the midnight index readings and the usage data for the previous day. They are not watching your smart meters in real time.

https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/information/the-smart-security-behind-the-gb-smart-metering-system

Even if it was possible, no burglar worthy of the name will go to the trouble of trying to hack the smart meter system just to see if someone is at home. A simple walk along any street is a good indicator of whether anybody is at home.

Swipe

Emily_Joy said:

ArbitraryRandom said:

Genuine question - do you have a smart phone... or even a mobile non-smart phone? 
Assuming you do, why is that okay but a smart meter not? 

I really don't get it. Yes, I do have a smart phone. It is not apple and it doesn't have google play, so most apps (including all banking apps) fail to run. My phone, I believe, doesn't give information as to whether the house is occupied or not to anyone.

Your broadband activity probably does though. 

2010

I don`t want to start a seperate thread so can someone answer this.
Are SM just one standard unit and can be set to different modes for whatever the consumer decides they want.
What I`m getting at is if you have an econ 7 meter at the moment, but no longer need it and you then get a SM fitted, can you ask for it to be set in single tariff mode. 
Are SM just standard units or are there different SM for econ 7?

dunstonh

2010 said:

I don`t want to start a seperate thread so can someone answer this.
Are SM just one standard unit and can be set to different modes for whatever the consumer decides they want.
What I`m getting at is if you have an econ 7 meter at the moment, but no longer need it and you then get a SM fitted, can you ask for it to be set in single tariff mode. 
Are SM just standard units or are there different SM for econ 7?

The same model can do single rate or multi-rate.