Lightweight Privacy-Aware Yet Accountable Secure Scheme for SM-SGCC Communications in Smart Grid

Smart grid is envisioned as a critical application of cyber-physical systems and of the internet of things. In the smart grid, smart meters equipped with wireless sensors can upload meter readings (data) to smart grid control and schedule centers via the advanced metering infrastructure to improve power delivery efficiency. However, data gathered in short intervals, such as 15 minutes, will expose customers’ detailed daily activities (for example, when they get up and when they use oven) using nonintrusive appliance load monitoring. Thus, data must be hidden to protect customers’ privacy. However, data accountability is still required for emergency responses or to trace back suspected intrusions, even though the data is anonymous. In addition to desired security requirements, this imposes two extra tasks: Sensors in smart meters usually have resource constraints; thus, the desired security protocols have to remain lightweight in terms of computation and storage cost. Furthermore, scalability and flexibility are required since there exist vast meters. This paper presents a lightweight Privacy-aware yet Accountable Secure Scheme called PASS which guarantees privacy-aware accountability yet tackles the above challenges in the smart grid. A formal security analysis justifies that PASS can attain the security goals, while a performance analysis verifies that PASS requires few computations, and is scalable and flexible.