Implementation of Standardized Secure Smart Meter Communication

The communication technologies for automatic meter reading (smart metering) and for energy production and distribution networks (smart grid) have the potential to be one of the first really highly scaled machine-to-machine-M2M-applications. During the last years, two very promising developments around the wireless part of the smart grid communication were initialized, which possibly could have an impact on the network architectures and the markets far beyond Germany and far beyond energy automation. Besides the specification of the OMS Group of a security extension to the Wireless M-Bus protocol (EN13757-4), the German Federal Office for Information Security (Bundesamt für Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik, BSI) has designed a Protection Profile (PP) and a Technical Directive (TR) for the communication unit of an intelligent measurement system (Smart Meter Gateway), which were released in March 2013. This design uses state of the art technologies and prescribes their implementation in real-life systems. At first, the proposed paper will present the most important characteristics of this architecture. It will then give an insight into the implementation of the OMS security protocols, which imply the usage of a mutually authenticated SSL protocol also in the Local Metrological Network. This is achieved with the help of an additional Authentication and Fragmentation Layer (AFL). This secure communication will be terminated in a BSI conformant secure smart meter gateway, which is developed in a different project and described in the second step. Finally, the contribution will discuss the integration of such a metering network into an overall telecommunication network and PKI infrastructure.