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WORKING WITH THE BEST The IT business has developed rapidly and has an entrepreneurial approach to standards. Firms develop systems together and, if they succeed in the marketplace, they try to get the key aspects of their platform adopted formally as a standard. As a result there are often several standards to choose from, and claims of compliance are made lightly. The utility industry’s approach is different; it is a mature industry whose players are extremely wary of vendor lock-in. At the same time, energy industry players operate billion-dollar assets with lifetimes of decades. Over the past few years, as the scale of smart meter and smart grid deployments has reached a new level, regulators, utilities and their customers have become increasingly concerned about the security of information on smart metering systems. Landis+Gyr is stepping up to the plate. The next release of the Gridstream solution ® will come with secure data communication channels between the smart meter and the head-end system. COMPLEX MATHEMATICS With the latest Gridstream release, Landis+Gyr solves ® an important part of the problem. Working together with industry associations, standardization bodies and security industry leader SafeNet. Inc., Landis+Gyr has developed a solution that guarantees the security of information passing over the networks used for smart meter communications. As a globally operating company, Landis+Gyr has been able to benefit from its experience in the United States for the development of its Gridstream ® secure data communication system. There is a mature regulatory environment in the U.S. and Landis+Gyr has already successfully deployed secure communication solutions for smart metering there. Utilities need to adopt a solution that combines proven security techniques and strong cryptographic capabilities. This is necessary not only to protect their network availability and metering data, but also to protect their consumers from malicious attacks affecting operations and potentially compromising their consumers’ private data.