EPPP4SMS: Efficient Privacy-Preserving Protocol for Smart Metering Systems and Its Simulation Using Real-World Data

The main contribution of this paper is the construction of the efficient privacy-preserving protocol for smart metering systems (EPPP4SMS), which brings together features of the best privacy-preserving protocols in the literature for smart grids. In addition, EPPP4SMS is faster on the meter side—and in the whole round (encryption, aggregation, and decryption)—than other protocols based on homomorphic encryption and it is still scalable. Moreover, EPPP4SMS enables energy suppliers and customers to verify the billing information and measurements without leaking private information. Since the energy supplier knows the amount of generated electricity and its flow throughout electrical substations, the energy supplier can use this verification to detect energy loss and fraud. Different from verification based on digital signature, our verification enables new features; for example, smart meters and their energy supplier can compute the verification without storing the respective encrypted measurements. Furthermore, EPPP4SMS may be suitable to many other scenarios that need aggregation of time-series data keeping privacy protected, including electronic voting, reputation systems, and sensor networks. In this paper, we present theoretical results of EPPP4SMS and their validation by implementation of algorithms and simulation using real-world measurement data.