It was always pretty obvious that "smart meters" would have severe repercussions for privacy, but until it started actually being a problem seemingly everyone dismissed such concerns as being in the same category of far-out conspiracy theory as worrying that they're a health risk due to radiation. Some still do. Humanity has so little common sense when it comes to things involving computers.
The Ontario government has had a few initiatives to push smart thermostats and my area just had our water meters upgraded to smart ones. I know nothing about the water meters, but I block the Google telemetry from my Nest Thermostat (unrelated to the gov't program) via my pi-hole at least. By definition, if you sign on to the Enbridge thermostat initiative you are agreeing to send your usage. Not really sure of the impacts of this article on Canada, but pretty chilling nonetheless!
Google stuff often hard codes 8.8.8.8, so unless you're forwarding all port 53 to your pihole, it's probably still getting out. Do the smart thing like I did and spend thousands of dollars on a proxmox host, virtualize opnsense, and tell Google where to stick it.
I do a black hole for any 8.8.8.8 traffic on my Unifi dream machine, so you don't need thousands of dollars in equipment. It can be done on Unifi which has cheaper options.
Incredibly dark. That's a harrowing read. Why do UK citizens allow this? I had always seen them as a mix of 'ard' and 'smart as hell'. But this. This just shames them.
