Smart Grid Privacy

Brent Struthersbrent.struthers@neustar.biz

Perceptions vs. Reality

Whose perceptions? Whose reality?

“I believe in looking reality straight in the eye and denying it.”

- Garrison Keillor

“I've wrestled with reality for 35 years, Doctor, and I'm happy to state I finally won out over it.”

– Jimmy Stewart

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Differing Perceptions

Smart meters help utilities as well as consumers — by making operations more efficient, enabling dynamic pricing and automated control to reduce peak demand, supporting the growth of renewable resources and electric vehicles, and more. –Alicia Carrasco & Peter Soderstrom on detectenergy.com

This detailed information makes the user understand the patterns and the volume of usage and giving him quick access to his current charges. –Carrie Thomson on healthyhomesmart.com

Imagine a device that could tell an observer everything you do in your home, down to how often you eat microwave dinners, how often you wash your towels, even what brand of washer-dryer you wash them in. –Sara Morgan on SmartMoney.com

PG&E’s rollout violates the Constitution, said Jed Gladstein, an attorney, author and radio blogger. “SmartMeters are the sharp end of a very long spear pointed at your freedoms,” he said. He urged a wave of citizen lawsuits challenging the program. –Ted Appel on WatchSonomaCounty.com

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Is This Smart Meter Data?

Figure 5‑1 How power use can reveal personal activities through nonintrusive appliance load monitoring From: Hart, G.W., “Nonintrusive Appliance Load Monitoring," Proceedings of the IEEE, December 1992, pp. 1870-1891

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How Far Do We Go?

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Best Laid Plans

From http://selecttelde11.blogspot.com/2009_09_01_archive.html Sept 22 2010

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