Financial impacts of smart meter security and privacy breach

Many power utility companies around the world are moving towards smart grid, which integrates power delivery infrastructure with information and communication technologies. Smart meter is one of the main components of smart grid. The task of a smart meter is to track energy consumption of a premise and send that information to the utility company. Although the use of smart meter has many benefits, there are a number of security concerns regarding its usage. One particular concern is regarding the impacts of security and privacy breach of smart meter. This paper focuses on the financial impacts of smart meter security and privacy breach. The financial impacts discussed in this paper are derived from the impacts of security and privacy breach described in the literature. It is found out that the financial loss may involve various parties including the premise owner, the utility company, as well as the nation. The amount of loss can also go up to billions of dollars. Given the large group of people who may be involved and the large amount of money to be potentially lost should a security or privacy breach occur, it is very important for power companies to establish a security policy regarding smart meter and to allocate reasonable amount of resources to secure the deployed smart meter as well as the rest of the smart grid infrastructure.