A Two-way Interactive Secure Communication Model for Electric Energy Metering Data
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.4108/ew.14632Keywords:
two-way interactive communication, identity authentication, access controlAbstract
INTRODUCTION: As power market reforms deepen, traditional unidirectional protocols (e.g., IEC 102) fail to meet the secure, real-time, and bidirectional data exchange requirements of modern power grids, leaving systems vulnerable to eavesdropping and tampering.
OBJECTIVES: To ensure the confidentiality, integrity, and reliability of power data transmission by overcoming the pattern leakage vulnerabilities of traditional encryption, while satisfying the strict real-time and high-frequency demands of large-scale power systems.
METHODS: Two schemes are designed: a pure SM4 symmetric encryption scheme for high-frequency data, and an SM2-SM4 hybrid scheme for advanced authentication. To enhance security, a novel ECB-CBC hybrid encryption mode is introduced for SM4.
RESULTS: The proposed ECB-CBC hybrid mode effectively eliminates plaintext redundancy. Its Shannon entropy stabilizes at ~7.99 bits/byte (nearly touching the 8.0 theoretical ideal, vastly improving upon standard ECB's ~3.5 bits/byte). It also achieves an optimal inter-block avalanche effect of ~64 bits per block. The SM2-SM4 hybrid scheme's encryption time is only 15%-20% higher than that of pure SM4. Across 1-16 thread tests, the throughput of both SM4-based schemes grows linearly, outperforming RSA and fully homomorphic encryption (FHE) by several orders of magnitude.
CONCLUSION: The proposed ECB-CBC hybrid architecture overcomes standard mode vulnerabilities and achieves the macro-level Strict Avalanche Criterion (SAC), significantly enhancing resistance to network attacks. Compared to traditional asymmetric and homomorphic encryption, the SM4 and SM2-SM4 schemes strike an optimal balance between robust security and computational efficiency for high-concurrency power system applications.
Downloads
References
[1] Lin B, Wei B. Power market reform incentivizes artificial intelligence investment: Evidence from China's electricity spot trading market pilot. Energy Policy. 2026;214: 115235.
[2] Lai S, Wang J, Wang Z, Huang S, Wang H, Hu Y, et al. Key Technologies for Data Collection, Modeling, and Sharing of Carbon Emissions from Electricity Consumption Based on Blockchain. International Conference on Smart Applications and Sustainability in the Artificial Intelligence of Things: Springer; 2024. 453-462.
[3] Pamulaparthy B, Macdonald D. Incorporating communication protocols for substation automation. Switchgear Design, Operation, and Maintenance Using Industry Standards: Elsevier; 2025. p. 135-172.
[4] Ayello M, Lopes Y. Battery energy storage systems associated with transmission lines: implementation proposal with IEC 61850 standard and feasibility case study. Electric Power Systems Research. 2025;241: 111382.
[5] Shingari N, Mago B. The importance of data encryption in ensuring the confidentiality and security of financial records of medical health. 2024 IEEE International Conference on Interdisciplinary Approaches in Technology and Management for Social Innovation (IATMSI): IEEE; 2024. 1-6.
[6] Shukla D, Chakrabarti S, Sharma A. Blockchain-based cyber-security enhancement of cyber–physical power system through symmetric encryption mechanism. International Journal of Electrical Power & Energy Systems. 2024;155: 109631.
[7] Zhao R, Lu J, Yu Z, Zeng K. A synchronous compression and encryption method for massive electricity consumption data privacy preserving. Frontiers in Energy Research. 2025;12: 1444505.
[8] Zhang Y, Lu W, Yu Q, Zhang S, Li W, Liang K. Power Data Federated Learning Privacy Policy Based on Optimized Homomorphic Encryption. 2024 IEEE 6th International Conference on Power, Intelligent Computing and Systems (ICPICS): IEEE; 2024. 624-629.
[9] Zheng Y, Wang X, Wen X, Tian M. System Using Computer Combined Data Encryption Technology in the Security Management of Electricity Bills. International Conference on Innovative Computing: Springer; 2024. 366-373.
[10] Song Y, Li H, Chen Y. Hardware Implementation of SM4 Encryption Algorithm with Hybrid Stochastic Computing. International Conference on Mobile Internet Security; Singapore: Springer; 2023. 66-77.
[11] Ayub MF, Li X, Mahmood K, Alenazi MJ, Das AK, Wang G. Provably secure efficient key-exchange protocol for intelligent supply line surveillance in smart grids. IEEE Internet of Things Journal. 2025;12(12): 1784-21792.
[12] Hussain SS, Aftab MA, Farooq SM, Latif A, Konstantinou C, Abido MA. A public key based quantum secure digital signature scheme for securing IEC 61850 R-GOOSE and R-SV messages. IEEE Transactions on Industry Applications. 2025;61(3): 5135-5147.
[13] Piètre-Cambacédès L, Bouissou M. Beyond attack trees: dynamic security modeling with Boolean logic Driven Markov Processes (BDMP). 2010 European Dependable Computing Conference: IEEE; 2010. 199-208.
[14] Sommestad T, Ekstedt M, Holm H. The cyber security modeling language: A tool for assessing the vulnerability of enterprise system architectures. IEEE Systems Journal. 2012;7(3): 363-373.
[15] Schneier B. Attack trees. Dr Dobb’s journal. 1999;24(12): 21-29.
[16] Bai Y, Hou Y, Fang D, He X, Zhu C. A remote real-time on-line monitoring and control system for large-scale wind farms. 2010 International Conference on Electrical and Control Engineering: IEEE; 2010. 3220-3223.
[17] Aytekin A, Coşkun A, Dursun M. Evolving Maturity Models for Electric Power System Cybersecurity: A Case-Driven Framework Gap Analysis. Applied Sciences. 2025;16(1): 177.
[18] Dai H, Chen J, Ni Y, Chen H, Yu Y, Ji X, et al. Research on improving the efficiency of wireless networking in the power system. Journal of Physics: Conference Series: IOP Publishing; 2024. 012100.
[19] Mahajan P. A study of encryption algorithms AES, DES and RSA for security. Global journal of computer science and technology. 2013;13(E15): 32-40.
[20] Yau AK, Paterson KG, Mitchell CJ. Padding oracle attacks on CBC-mode encryption with secret and random IVs. International Workshop on Fast Software Encryption: Springer; 2005. 299-319.
[21] Valsan V, Keerthan K, Devnath N, Ajithkumar A, Sasikumar A. Securing Sustainable Energy Trading: An RSA-Encrypted IoT Solution for Smart Meter Data Transmission. 2024 International Conference on Computational Intelligence and Computing Applications (ICCICA): IEEE; 2024. 187-192.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Xu Chen, Chao Zhang, Fei Liang, Yu Yan, Baofeng Li, Xiaomeng Duan, Yingjie Zhao
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 4.0 license, which permits unlimited use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium so long as the original work is properly cited.
