smart meters

[websterstech at gmail.com (Scott Webster)]

The city I live in is using this companies products to meter water usage.

http://www.itron.com/pages/products_detail.asp?id=itr_000428.xml

-----Original Message-----
From: pauldotcom-bounces at mail.pauldotcom.com
[mailto:pauldotcom-bounces at mail.pauldotcom.com] On Behalf Of Robin Wood
Sent: Monday, May 11, 2009 2:43 PM
To: PaulDotCom Mailing List
Subject: [Pauldotcom] smart meters

Hi
Some utility providers are looking at rolling out smart meters for gas
and electricity which they can read remotely. Does anyone know how
that works? What are they using to connect to the device to send out
the data? If it is over your broadband then it won't be long till
someone sniffs the packets and sends fake readings back, if it is
wireless and they have a guy drive past then there are similar
sniffing problems, you also have to worry about interference. They
could have a GSM card in, in which case, how long till someone cracks
one open and tries to use the card in a phone, I imagine it would be
locked to a single number but people would try.

I can't think of a secure and problem free way to do this. Any ideas?

Here is a BBC video about the meters.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8040232.stm

Robin
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