Information security issues in the development of smart water meters cannot be ignored

Water meter, as a daily measuring device used by every household, plays a very important role in life. Because traditional mechanical water meters have problems such as data copying, labor cost, data accuracy, difficulty in entering households, and the development of science and technology and the implementation of ladder water prices, smart water meters have become the future development trend of the water meter industry.

 

According to forecasts, the market size of smart water meters is expected to increase from 3.66 billion yuan in 2015 to 7.004 billion yuan in 2020, which is expected to usher in substantial growth. In particular, the new generation of Internet of Things and NB-IoT smart water meters will achieve mass production and intelligence. The growth rate of water meters will remain above 28%, and the market prospect is broad. Although the development of smart water meters is rapid, it brings a lot of convenience to people's lives. But security issues still exist. Recently, the two world's top information security conferences, Blackhat and Defcon, were successfully held in Las Vegas. The world's top security companies and hackers will gather to showcase the latest scientific research on network security.

 

The Internet security company 360 from China brought the 7 major issues to the two major events and once again set a new high in the number of contributions from domestic participating companies. One of the important issues is the security analysis of Lora smart water meters.

 

Lora smart water meter is a kind of terminal water meter in the wireless remote transmission scheme. The main application technology is LoRa technology. Since LoRa technology started earlier, after several years of exploration and practice, the wireless remote water meter LoRa technology has been very mature and is widely used in urban water supply measurement projects.

 

At the Defcon conference, the safety team from the 360 Unicorn used a LORA smart water meter system as an example to analyze the safety hazards from physical sensors. During the demonstration, the unicorn team not only successfully intercepted the data content sent by the water meter through the self-made hardware tools, but also found the water meter data of the nearby normal users, and then maliciously forged any node to report the water meter data and tamper with the data.

 

Today, with the rapid development of technology, the application of smart water meters brings convenience to enterprises and users, and at the same time puts higher requirements on the information security of water meters. In fact, at present, China still lacks corresponding protection for information storage and information transmission in the practical application of smart water meters. On the one hand, the data of smart water meters may be tampered with and used to increase the household's water fee burden. On the other hand, the leakage of a large amount of data has deeply hidden dangers for residents and cities.

In the face of the problems existing in smart water meters, the Zhibiao Committee has begun to call for the independent controllability of cryptographic algorithms and cryptographic products. Relevant units have initiated research on relevant programs. Based on extensive research on the status quo of the industry, experts have been organized to demonstrate and develop. A security chip technology solution based on the SM4 algorithm. However, there is still a long way to go in the safety of smart meters.

 

In the process of rapid development of smart water meters, we must not lose sight of it. Only on the basis of the simultaneous development of technology and information can we promote the further development of the smart water meter industry.