Privacy preserving smart grid management in the cloud

Abstract

The smart grid is a decent idea for improving energy efficiency, however its functionality requires frequent exchange and processing of household electricity consumption data. On the other hand, the exchange of high frequency household electricity consumption data may reveal private personal information such as when a person is at home, when she goes to bed, what time she wakes up and even which household appliances she uses. The privacy of this sensitive data should be protected even from the utility company. Furthermore, utility companies may consider outsourcing their smart grid data communication and processing tasks to the cloud to avoid the cost of investments on infrastructure. In such a scenario, protecting the privacy of sensitive user electricity consumption data, transmitted in a public network, would become even more critical. We address this issue by proposing a secret-sharing scheme that allows for private distribution and processing of user electricity consumption data in the cloud. © 2015 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.