XPost: can.internet.highspeed   
   From: Canuck57@nospam.com   
      
   On 18/06/2010 4:51 PM, sysop wrote:   
   > "Some Guy"  wrote in message news:4C1A39D6.866A8B79@guy.com...   
   >> Our residential meter was recently changed here in this SW-Ontario city   
   >> where I live.   
   >>   
   >> I happened to be home so I asked the guy some questions.   
   >>   
   >> He took a picture of the existing meter with some sort of   
   >> industrial-looking (rubber-encased) cell phone, and punched in some   
   >> numbers into the phone.  This was the final meter reading I guess.   
   >>   
   >> Then he cut the security tag off the band that holds the meter in place   
   >> and placed a large plastic collar around the meter and pulled the meter   
   >> out of it's socket.  He then took a new meter and simply plugged it in   
   >> (matching the 4 prongs or contacts with their mates) before pushing it   
   >> into place.  Then he installed a new band and security tag.  This took   
   >> all of about 2 minutes.  He was walking from house to house, dressed in   
   >> an orange jump suit, wearing a hard hat, pulling a small hand cart   
   >> loaded with meters.  He puts a letter in the mailbox (I didn't read mine   
   >> yet) before he changes the meter.   
   >>   
   >> I asked how these meters communicate their data, and he said they have a   
   >> low power radio transmitter that talks to neighboring meters and the   
   >> data gets passed along like a chain.  At some point they must have a   
   >> local area receiver mounted to a telephone pole or located in a phone   
   >> pedestal and that's where the data gets uplinked to a billing center.  I   
   >> asked if there would be (or could be) a small display unit inside the   
   >> home that could display this info in real time, but he said he didn't   
   >> think so - that instead you could go to a web site and look up your   
   >> usage that way.   
   >>   
   >> The guy installing this was contracted in from a nearby town that had   
   >> already performed the conversion to electronic meter.  He said that his   
   >> residential meter was different than the one he was putting on my house   
   >> - the LCD display was in a different place, fewer bar codes on the   
   >> meter, etc.   
   >>   
   >> I'm thinking that would give the utility company some great   
   >> IP-to-address mapping that they can re-sell to geo-ip providers.   
   >>   
   >> Maybe if I encase my meter in tin foil (grounding the foil should be no   
   >> problem) then they'd get no data from my meter.  Hmmm...   
   >   
   > http://www.horizonutilities.com/HHSC/html/smart_meter/sm_how.jsp   
   >   
   > http://www.elstermetering.org/downloads/REX-meter-data-sheet.pdf   
   > Communication frequency 902 MHz to 915 MHz (unlicensed)   
   > Communication rate 900 MHz radio 17,600 bps   
      
   With that, make a jammer.   
      
      
   --   
   The bigger government gets, the more it tends to rule out common sense.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)