Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Smart Meters as Non-purpose Built Surveillance Tools

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:
Privacy Technologies and Policy (APF 2016)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNSC,volume 9857))

Included in the following conference series:

Abstract

This paper analysis the potential use of smart meters as surveillance tools by law enforcement authorities. In assessing the challenges that the introduction of smart meters in the European Union creates for the right to privacy and data protection of individuals the paper takes a fundamental rights approach based on the existing European legal framework, case law and doctrine. The legal analysis is augmented by technical/engineering studies that show the interest that smart meter data has for law enforcement authorities. It is argued that the current EU legal framework is not adequate for addressing the challenges that surveillance via smart meter data creates for the rights of the individuals and that the existing legal gap must be taken into account and used in favour of the protection of the fundamental rights of the individuals.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    For the scope of this paper we consider only smart meters that measure the consumption of electricity and not of water or gas. In addition, also our usage of the term “energy” is limited to electric energy and does not cover gas or other forms of energy.

  2. 2.

    With this term in this paper are understood distribution system operators, transmission system operators, electricity supply undertakings or other parties that receive the data directly from the meter in accordance with the electricity distribution system.

  3. 3.

    Analog meters that are still present in those households that have not yet installed smart ones.

  4. 4.

    Director of metering services at Siemens Energy.

  5. 5.

    As defined by the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary.

  6. 6.

    Joint cases C-293/12 and C-594/12 Digital Rights Ireland and Seitlinger and others [2014] nyr, para. 27.

  7. 7.

    C-180/04 Vassallo v. Azienda Ospedaliera Ospedale San Martino di Genova e Cliniche Universitarie Convenzionate [2006] ECR I-7251, para. 26; M.M. v. The Netherlands, ECHR application no. 39339/98, 8 April 2003, para. 42; A. v. France, ECHR application no. 14838/89, 23 November 1993, paras. 38–39.

  8. 8.

    Kruslin v. France, ECHR application no. 11801/85, 24 April 1990, para. 28.

  9. 9.

    Lambert v. France, ECHR application no. 23618/94, 24 August 1998, para. 40.

  10. 10.

    Ibidem para. 38.

  11. 11.

    Klass v. Germany, ECHR application no. 5029/71, 6 September 1978, para. 50; Weber and Saravia v. Germany, ECHR application no. 54934/00, 29 June 2006, para. 114.

  12. 12.

    Association for European Integration and Human Rights and Ekimdzhiev v. Bulgaria, ECHR application no. 62540/00, 28 June 2007, para. 91.

  13. 13.

    Liberty and Others v. The United Kingdom, ECHR application no. 58243/00, 1 July 2008, para. 63.

  14. 14.

    Weber and Saravia (n 13) para. 78.

References

  1. Anderson, R., Fuloria, S.: On the security economics of electricity metering. In: Proceedings of the Ninth Workshop on the Economics of Information Security (WEIS 2010), vol. 18 (2010)

    Google Scholar 

  2. Article 29 Data Protection Working Party (2011) Opinion 12/2011 on Smart Metering, 4 April 2011

    Google Scholar 

  3. Beckel, C., et al.: Revealing household characteristics from smart meter data. Energy 78, 397–410 (2014)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Bennett, C.: The public surveillance of personal data: A cross-national analyses. In: Lyon, D., Zureik, E. (eds.) Computers, surveillance, and privacy, pp. 237–259. University of Minessota Press, Minnesota (1996)

    Google Scholar 

  5. Bigo, D. et al.: National programmes for mass surveillance of personal data in EU Member States and their compatibility with EU law, Study submitted to the European Parliament’s Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (2013). http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/etudes/join/2013/493032/IPOL-LIBE_ET(2013)493032_EN.pdf. Accessed 1 Nov 2013

  6. Bohli, J., Sorge, C., Ugus, O.: On the security economics of the electricity metering. In: Proceedings of 2010 IEEE International Conference on Communications Workshops, vol. 10 (2010)

    Google Scholar 

  7. Cavoukian, A., Polonetsky, J., Wolf, C.: Smart privacy for the smart grid: embedding privacy into the design of electricity conservation (2010). https://www.privacybydesign.ca/index.php/paper/smartprivacy-for-the-smart-grid-embedding-privacy-into-the-design-of-electricity-conservation/. Accessed 15 Apr 2015

  8. Chalmers, D., Davies, G., Monti, G.: European Union Law, 3rd edn. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge (2014)

    Google Scholar 

  9. Clarke, R.: Introduction to Dataveillance and Information Privacy, and Definitions of Terms (1997). http://www.rogerclarke.com/DV/Intro.html. Accessed 22 May 2014

  10. Commission Recommendation 2012/148/EU of 9 March 2012 on preparations for the roll-out of smart metering systems, OJ L 73, 13 March 2012

    Google Scholar 

  11. Commission Recommendation 2014/724/EU of 10 October 2014 on the Data Protection Impact Assessment Template for Smart Grid and Smart Metering Systems, OJ L 300, 18 October 2014

    Google Scholar 

  12. Convention 108 for the protection of individuals with regard to automatic processing of personal data, 28 January 1981

    Google Scholar 

  13. Council Framework Decision 2008/977/JHA of 27 November 2008 on the protection of personal data processed in the framework of police and judicial cooperation in criminal matters, OJ L 350, 30 December 2008

    Google Scholar 

  14. Covrig, C.F. et al.: Smart Grids Projects Outlook (2014). http://cencenelec.eu/EN/EuropeanStandardization/HotTopics/SmartGrids/SGCG_SGIS_Report.pdf. Accessed 29 Apr 2015

  15. Cuijpers, C., Koops, B.-J.: Smart metering and privacy in Europe: Lessons from the Dutch case. In: Gutwirth, S., Leenes, R., de Hert, P., Poullet, Y. (eds.) European Data Protection: Coming of Age, pp. 269–293. Springer, Dordrecht (2012)

    Google Scholar 

  16. Datenschutzgesetz 2000, Bundesgesetz über den Schutz personenbezongener Daten (2000)

    Google Scholar 

  17. De Hert, P., Boehm, F.: The rights of notification after surveillance is over: ready for recognition? In: Bus, J., et al. (eds.) Digital Enlightment Year Book 2012, vol. 19. IOS Press, Amsterdam (2012)

    Google Scholar 

  18. Directive 2004/22/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 31 March 2004 on Measuring Instruments, OJ L 135, 30 April 2004

    Google Scholar 

  19. Directive 2006/24/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 March 2006 on the retention of data generated or processed in connection with the provision of publicly available electronic communications services or of public communications networks and amending Directive 2002/58/EC, OJ L 105, 13 April 2006

    Google Scholar 

  20. Directive 2006/32/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 5 April 2006 on energy end-use efficiency and energy services and repealing Council Directive 93/76/EEC, OJ L 114, 27 April 2006

    Google Scholar 

  21. Directive 2009/72/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 13 July 2009 concerning common rules for the internal market in electricity and repealing Directive 2003/54/EC, OJ L 211, 14 August 2009

    Google Scholar 

  22. Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 October 1995 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, OJ L 281, 23 November 1995

    Google Scholar 

  23. Directive 2016/680 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data by competent authorities for the purposes of the prevention, investigation, detection or prosecution of criminal offences or the execution of criminal penalties, and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Council Framework Decision 2008/977/JHA

    Google Scholar 

  24. EDPS. Opinion of the European Data Protection Supervisor on the Commission Recommendation on preparations for the roll-out of smart metering systems (2012)

    Google Scholar 

  25. Enev, M., Gupta, S., Kohno, T., Patel, S.: Televisions, video privacy, and powerline electromagnetic interference. In: Proceedings of the 18th ACM Conference on computers and communications security, pp. 537–550 (2011)

    Google Scholar 

  26. Essential regulatory requirements and recommendations for data handling December 2011. data safety, and consumer protection. Recommendation to the European Commission, 5 December 2011

    Google Scholar 

  27. Explanatory memorandum on the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe draft Resolution and draft Report on Mass Surveillance prepared by Mr. Pieter Omtzigt, rapporteur. http://assembly.coe.int/nw/xml/XRef/X2H-Xref-ViewPDF.asp?FileID=21583&lang=en. Accessed 28 Apr 2015

  28. Faraqui, A., Harris, D., Hledik, R.: Unlocking the €53 billion savings from smart meters in the EU: How increasing the adoption of dynamic tariffs could make or break the EU’s smart grid investment. Energy Policy 38(10), 6222–6231 (2010)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  29. Guiding document to the UK Regulation of Investigatory Powers Acts 2000 by the Leeds City Council Legal Services (2013). http://www.leeds.gov.uk/docs/RIPA%20Guidance%20and%20Procedure%20-%20May%202013.pdf. Accessed 30 Mar 2015

  30. Hargreaves, T., Nye, M., Burgess, J.: Making energy visible: a quantitative field study of how households interact with energy from smart energy monitors. Energy Policy 38, 6111–6119 (2010)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  31. Jenness, V., Smith, D.A., Stepan-Norris, J.: Taking a look at surveillance studies. Contemp. Sociol. J. Rev. 36(2), vii–viii (2007)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  32. Jones, K.B., Zoppo, D.: A Smarter, Greener Grid. Praeger, Santa Barbara (2014)

    Google Scholar 

  33. Kalogridis, G., Denic, S.: Data mining and privacy of personal behavior types in smart grid. In: Proceedings of the 11th IEEE International Conference on Data Mining Workshops, pp. 636–642 (2011)

    Google Scholar 

  34. Kim, Y., Schmid, T., Srivastava, M., Wang, Y.: Challenges in resource monitoring for residential spaces. In: Proceedings of the first ACM Workshop on Embeded Sensing Systems for Energy-Efficiency in Buildings, pp. 1–6 (2009)

    Google Scholar 

  35. King, N.J., Jessen, P.W.: Smart metering systems and data sharing: why getting a smart meter should also mean getting strong information privacy controls to manage data sharing. Int. J. Law Inf. Technol. 22, 1–39 (2014)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  36. Knyrim, R., Trieb, G.: Smart metering under EU data protection law. Int. Data Priv. Law 1(2), 121–128 (2011)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  37. Korff, D.: The rule of law on the internet and in the wider world, Issue Paper published by the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights (2014). https://wcd.coe.int/ViewDoc.jsp?id=2268589. Accessed 1 May 2015

  38. Lerner, J.I., Mulligan, D.K.: Taking the long view on the fourth amendment: stored records and the sanctity of the home. Stanford Technol. Law Rev. 3, 13 (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  39. Lisovich, M., Mulligan, D., Wicker, S.: Inferring personal information from demand-response systems. IEEE Secur. Priv. 8, 11–20 (2010)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  40. Lo Schiavo, L., Fumagalli, E., Olivieri, V.: Changing the regulation for regulating the change - innovation‐driven regulatory developments in Italy: smart grids, smart metering and e‐mobility. IEFE Working Paper Series, vol. 46, p. 40 (2011)

    Google Scholar 

  41. McDaniel, P.: Security and privacy challenges in the smart grid. IEEE Secur. Priv. 7, 75–77 (2009)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  42. McKenna, E., Richardson, I., Thomson, M.: Smart meter data: balancing consumer privacy concerns with legitimate applications. Energy Policy 41, 807–814 (2012)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  43. Milaj, J.: Invalidation of the data retention directive – extending the proportionality test. Comput. Law Secur. Rev. 31(5), 604–617 (2015)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  44. Milaj, J., Mifsud Bonnici, J.P.: Unwitting subjects of surveillance and the presumption of innocence. Comput. Law Secur. Rev. 30(4), 419–428 (2014)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  45. Milaj, J., Mifsud Bonnici, J.P.: Privacy issues in the use of smart meters—law enforcement use of smart meter data. In: Beaulieu, A., De Wilde, J., Scherpen, J.M.A. (eds.) Smart Grids from a Global Perspective, pp. 179–196. Springer, Dordrecht (2016)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  46. Mills, E.: Researchers find smart meters could reveal favorite TV shows, CNet News (2012). http://news.cnet.com/8301–27080_3-57364883-245/researchers-find-smart-meters-could-reveal-favorite-tv-shows/. Accessed 27 Apr 2013

  47. Pallas, F.: Beyond gut level – some critical remarks on the German privacy approach to smart metering. In: Gutwirth, S., Leenes, R., de Hert, P., Poullet, Y. (eds.) European Data Protection: Coming of Age, pp. 313–345. Springer, Dordrecht (2013)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  48. Quinn, E.L.: Privacy and the new energy infrastructure, CEES Working Paper no. 09-0001, vol. 41 (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  49. Recommendation no. R(87)15 of the Committee of Ministers regulating the use of personal data in the police sector

    Google Scholar 

  50. Roberts, H., Palfrey, J.: The EU data retention directive in an era of internet surveillance. In: Deibert, R., et al. (eds.) Access Controlled: The Shaping of Power, Rights, and Rule in Cyberspace, pp. 35–53. MIT Press, Cambridge (2010)

    Google Scholar 

  51. Savirimuthu, J.: Smart meters and the information panopticon: beyond the rhetoric of compliance. Int. Rev. Law Comput. Technol. 27(1–2), 161–186 (2013)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  52. Smart Grid Coordination Group. Document for the M/490 Mandate Smart Grid Information society (2014). http://cencenelec.eu/EN/EuropeanStandardization/HotTopics/SmartGrids/SGCG_SGIS_Report.pdf. Accessed 29 Apr 2015

  53. Subrahmanyan, P.A.: Network security architecture for demand response/sensor networks, report for the California Energy Commission, Public Interest Energy Research Group (2005). http://www.law.berkeley.edu/files/demand_response_CEC.pdf. Accessed 15 Apr 2015

  54. UK Smart metering implementation programme PIA 2012 (2012). https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/43044/7226-sm-privacy-ia.pdf. Accessed 4 Jan 2016

  55. Weiss, M., Helfenstein, A., Mattern, F., Staake, T.: Leveraging smart meter data to recognize home appliances. In: Proceedings of IEEE Pervasive Computing and Communication PerCom, vol. 8 (2012)

    Google Scholar 

  56. Wigan, M., Clarke, R.: Social impacts of transport surveillance. In: Prometheus: Critical studies in Innovation, vol. 24, no. 4, pp. 389–403 (2006)

    Google Scholar 

  57. Wynn, G.: Privacy concerns challenge smart grid rollout, Reuters 25 June 2010. http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/06/25/energy-smart-idUSLDE65N2CI20100625. Accessed 13 May 2015

  58. Zeadalli, S., Pathan, A.-S., Alcaraz, C., Badra, M.: Towards privacy protection in smart grid. Wireless Pers. Commun. 73, 23–50 (2013)

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of European and Economic Law, Faculty of Law, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands

    Jonida Milaj & Jeanne Pia Mifsud Bonnici

Authors
  1. Jonida Milaj
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Jeanne Pia Mifsud Bonnici
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jonida Milaj .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. ENISA , Athens, Greece

    Stefan Schiffner

  2. Goethe University Frankfurt am Main , Frankfurt, Germany

    Jetzabel Serna

  3. ENISA , Athens, Greece

    Demosthenes Ikonomou

  4. Goethe University Frankfurt am Main , Frankfurt, Germany

    Kai Rannenberg

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2016 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

About this paper

Cite this paper

Milaj, J., Mifsud Bonnici, J.P. (2016). Smart Meters as Non-purpose Built Surveillance Tools. In: Schiffner, S., Serna, J., Ikonomou, D., Rannenberg, K. (eds) Privacy Technologies and Policy. APF 2016. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 9857. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-44760-5_6

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-44760-5_6

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-44759-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-44760-5

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation