Mirosław Wróblewski, President of the Personal Data Protection Office, has submitted comments to Miłosz Motyka, Minister of Energy, on proposed amendments to the current regulations governing energy consumption metering systems. He drew attention to the risk of excessive collection of consumer data, which could potentially make it possible to determine patterns in their daily lives. It was also pointed out that the proposed provisions would prevent consumers from having direct and transparent access to information on their energy consumption.

From a personal data protection perspective, the supervisory authority has concerns about the measurement frequency envisaged in the draft, namely at least once per second. This would enable data to be collected at a high frequency and, consequently, make it possible to profile energy consumers' lifestyles and daily activities. In the President of the Personal Data Protection Office's view, collecting data this frequently could constitute an excessive interference with individuals' privacy.

Furthermore, the annex to the draft regulation omits the requirements for metering devices laid down in EU law, which would adversely affect consumers' rights to obtain direct and transparent readings of their energy consumption. The omission of these requirements would prevent consumers from reading the relevant parameters without recourse to external instructions. As a result, they would be deprived of the access to billing data guaranteed to them by law unless they met additional conditions.

The President of the Personal Data Protection Office stressed the need to analyse the proposed provisions to determine whether they comply with the principle of data minimisation and to establish whether the intended objectives could be achieved by less intrusive means. This is particularly important for consumers who do not use dynamic tariffs. In addition, in view of the identified risks to individuals' rights, the need to carry out a privacy test during the legislative process was highlighted, including an assessment of the impact on data protection.