under which all electricity meters in Poland are to be replaced with smart ones by 2028. Today, readings have to be written down manually and sent to energy companies, which periodically send employees to check that the data matches consumption. Modern meters themselves provide such information to the enterprise and do it much more often, because they send information every quarter of an hour or even every tens of seconds. However, such devices are at risk of being hacked.
Smart electricity meters can be an easy target for hackers
on energy infrastructure is nothing new. In 2016, the heating was cut off to the residents of two blocks of flats in the Finnish city of Lappeenranta. In 2022, Przedsiębiorstwo Energetyki Cieplnej in Elbląg fell victim to a cyberattack, whose IT network was infected with malware. In this case, the goal was not to prevent the supply of thermal energy, but to take over the data of some customers. Attacks on the Ukrainian power grid are even worse. The attack on the nuclear power plant in Zaporizhia in 2015 cut off electricity for six hours about 700,000. farms, enumerates the Dagma company, which deals with IT security.
The heating and energy industries are treated as targets by cybercrime groups. These actions can have serious consequences, which makes entrepreneurs beware
– says Aleksander Kostuch, an engineer at Stormshield, a manufacturer of cybersecurity solutions.
Smart meters are being replaced. Uncertified devices allowed
a great replacement of meters is underway, and by 2025 every fourth meter is to be smart. Energa listed the largest number of them and already has 2 million out of 3.3 million customers, while only a few hundred thousand out of 5.5 million customers. The threat to energy security posed by hacker attacks is exacerbated by the issue of certification of these new meters. The industry has been warning for many months that companies from outside Europe (mainly from Asia) have been granted easier access to the Polish market and no security requirements have been imposed on them, according to “Gazeta Wyborcza”.
We are probably the only EU country in which there is no certified unit dealing with testing, verification of compliance and checking hardware and software in terms of digital security and interoperability. (…) This is happening at the expense of European and Polish producers and our national economy”
– Wyborcza.biz quotes the September article of the Polish Chamber of Commerce for Electronics and Telecommunications.
There is no entity that would be responsible for basic verification/audit at potential suppliers for hundreds of millions of meters equipped with tools to remotely ‘cut off’ energy
– warns KIGEiT. Smart meters not only give hackers a chance to cut off electricity. Such devices collect numerous personal data.
Source: Gazeta
Mabel is a talented author and journalist with a passion for all things technology. As an experienced writer for the 247 News Agency, she has established a reputation for her in-depth reporting and expert analysis on the latest developments in the tech industry.
