Smart meters vulnerable to cyber attack

The website smartgridawareness.org, which features intelligent commentary on issues relating to “smart” meters and the “smart” grid has revealed a simple strategy that hackers could use to economically paralyse any country that is dependent on so called “smart” meters to measure electricity use at households and businesses.

As you can see at the link below, any person, organisation or country with hostile intent who has programming skills (or the money to hire the services of a programmer) could cause economic and social chaos in a targeted area through the following means:

1)  Hack into the computer system controlling smart meters

2) Access the “remote disconnect” feature and switch off power to homes and businesses

As smartgridawareness.org reports:

In 2009, a researcher named Mike Davis developed a worm that was designed to do just this…

“The vendor scoffed at Davis’s simulation, …  That’s when Davis delivered his final blow and told the vendor that his malicious software didn’t just turn the power off, it also deleted the firmware update on the meters so they couldn’t be updated again to restore power. …

The full story is at this link:  http://smartgridawareness.org/2015/02/16/smart-meters-not-secured/

The vulnerability of smart meters to cyber attacks is another good reason to keep your analogue (Ferraris) meter or to insist on a non-smart meter if your existing meter has reached the end of its useful life and needs to be replaced. Smart meters are not compulsory in NZ.

NB:  If you are interested in the smart meter issue, please sign up to the free email list on www.stopsmartmeters.org.nz  Thank you.