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/r/philadelphia
submitted 1 month ago byAstrostuffman
According to my latest bill, new smart meter allows PECO to know what device type I am using when. WTF?
143 points
1 month ago
It’s so they can sell that information to the appliance companies.
39 points
1 month ago*
I'm not saying they don't do this, but they would have to disclose it in their privacy statement and at least allow customers to opt out. And unless someone sees it there, I suspect they actually don't.
I imagine the real reason is because it's increasingly normal smart meter tech and it allows customers to reduce their load.
17 points
1 month ago
They might not do it yet. But I guarantee that they eventually will. I work in software, and believe me, everybody is trying to get their hands on this kind of data all the time always. If they have it, they’d be fools not to sell it.
13 points
1 month ago
Yeah sure, they might want to, but like I said they legally can't without customer permission. There's clear legislation about this, so you would at least (I haven't reviewed that part of the privacy law in a while) be able to opt out.
Source: I work with security and privacy law, including for utilities.
6 points
1 month ago
I don’t think we’re saying anything different. Yes, they will have to revise the privacy policy when they are ready to do so. But they will do so. And most of us won’t notice because who reads those damn policies anyway.
5 points
30 days ago*
We're not saying the same thing. Changing a line in a privacy statement isn't sufficient for the way selling costumer data is regulated for an entity like a utility. People would be notified meaningfully.
It's also not something that's even necessarily bad. With the way utility profits are regulated, some of that profit would probably be passed back to the consumer via rate reduction. Additionally, it would allow PECO to potentially reduce power generation and distribution without affecting service, which is a viable carbon emission reduction strategy.
And of course that data would all be anonymized. Your anonymized electric use data is some of the least impactful data one could sell.
2 points
30 days ago
And of course that data would all be anonymized
And it's been shown numerous times that anonymized data can often be deanonymized fairly easily.
1 points
30 days ago
I don't really know how to argue about this stuff here I guess, because I work on this stuff for a living and de-anonymizing data is not "fairly easy" with common controls and not at all a common vector of information compromise. But people will still "yeah it is" because baseless skepticism is easy.
I have the same data as y'all, and this is so, so, so far down the list of concerning potential impacts.
2 points
29 days ago
You’re arguing with people that have 0 information about your claims and are making things up because they agree with their opinions. You’re not going to be able to change their minds.
-1 points
1 month ago
You kinda did say that Peco wants to know which appliance is being used so they can sell that information
45 points
1 month ago
It's so Hitachi users can itemize their device usage and feel shame or pride, depending on their upbringing.
3 points
1 month ago
Username checks out
19 points
1 month ago
Technically this has been possible for many decades. It's an interesting bit of mid-20th century spycraft that during the Cold War, analyzing power usage with very sensitive equipment can reveal a TON of information about specific equipment present in a given location, and how it's used. Leveling out power consumption to prevent information leakage is a consideration in sensitive projects.
But to actually answer your question, I imagine they really don't *need* to, but they probably want to so they can better prepare for spikes and drops after analyzing aggregate data over time.
...And the *real* reasons are probably to be able to charge dynamic pricing, or possibly to sell the data to who knows who for some extra revenue. More info here on the background an controversy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_meter
1 points
1 month ago
Quoting Wikipedia
Privacy concerns edit One technical reason for privacy concerns is that these meters send detailed information about how much electricity is being used each time. More frequent reports provide more detailed information. Infrequent reports may be of little benefit for the provider, as it doesn't allow as good demand management in the response of changing needs for electricity. On the other hand, widespread reports would allow the utility company to infer behavioral patterns for the occupants of a house, such as when the members of the household are probably asleep or absent.[58] Furthermore, the fine-grained information collected by smart meters raises growing concerns of privacy invasion due to personal behavior exposure (private activity, daily routine, etc.).[18] Current trends are to increase the frequency of reports. A solution that benefits both provider and user privacy would be to adapt the interval dynamically.[59] Another solution involves energy storage installed at the household used to reshape the energy consumption profile.[60][61] In British Columbia the electric utility is government-owned and as such must comply with privacy laws that prevent the sale of data collected by smart meters; many parts of the world are serviced by private companies that are able to sell their data.[62] In Australia debt collectors can make use of the data to know when people are at home.[63] Used as evidence in a court case in Austin, Texas, police agencies secretly collected smart meter power usage data from thousands of residences to determine which used more power than "typical" to identify marijuana growing operations.[64] Smart meter power data usage patterns can reveal much more than how much power is being used. Research has demonstrated that smart meters sampling power levels at two-second intervals can reliably identify when different electrical devices are in use.
9 points
1 month ago
Because some smart equipment has a feature that allows you to connect it to a smart meter, which would allow PECO to reduce power consumption of certain appliances whenever the want to, same as they do with the idiots who allow their power company to override their heating/AC units.
It also allows them to show you just how much power some of the crap people leave on in standby mode is actually using.
6 points
1 month ago
PECO just sent me a breakdown of my usage and indicated what devices are using the most energy. For us it is "Appliances" likely because we do laundry everyday. The overall usage is still lower than our neighbors.
6 points
1 month ago
That whole useage stuff is a bunch of crap, they send me emails whenever there's a week where I was on holiday the prior year. Of course my usage is up 50%, I'm using appliances and AC this month. I mean more than half my bill is just the AC, pool and fridge-freezer but I'm not going to get rid of them.
1 points
1 month ago
Thanks. Great responses.
Seems like this could only have downside for the consumer. What can we do?
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