Opower’s Data Principles

INSIGHT & VALUE

Our goal is to use data to give you the information you need to take control of your energy use. We're committed to providing insights to help you use energy more productively—and presenting that information in an easy-to-understand, actionable format. By analyzing data provided to us by utilities, third parties, and consumers themselves, we're able to help families like yours make smarter decisions about their energy use. We're constantly looking for ways to provide you with insights and opportunities that will help you save energy and save money.

The Average person spends 6 minutes a year thinking about their energy use. Greg Guthridge, Managing Director Utility Customer Care Practice, Accenture

ACCESS & TRANSPARENCY

At Opower, we believe you have a right to know the details of how you use energy and how you can save energy. We strive to work with our utility partners to give you as much access as possible to information about your energy use. For this reason, we allow you to create, monitor, and modify your profile to be sure that we're providing you with the most transparent and useful insights.

Surveys show that more than one in three consumers do not understand their energy bills. Consumer Focus, “Missing the Mark,” June 2011.

PRIVACY

Privacy is important to us. We do not sell or rent names or other personally identifiable information. We will never let another company use energy usage data that identifies you in any way without your permission to do so.

Opower will not provide your personally identifiable information to government or law enforcement officials, unless required to do so by law or a court order.

39% of consumers believe the Smart Grid will diminish their privacy. Ponemon Institute, “Perceptions about Privacy on the Smart Grid,” November 2010.

CHOICE

Opower is committed to helping customers take control of their energy use. We believe you should have choices about the kind of information you receive and the way your information is used. That’s why Opower’s platform allows you to personalize the information you receive from us or a utility using the Opower platform. You can choose to receive additional information or services from Opower, or you can choose to opt-out completely from any communication, whether by email, SMS, paper reports, or some other method. It’s also why we give you the opportunity to personalize the information you provide to us about your energy use, and to make choices about how your information may be used to offer you energy-saving products and services.

67% of Americans believe consumers have lost control over how personal information is collected and used by companies. J. Turow, J. King, C. J. Hoofnagle, A. Bleakley, and M. Hennessy, “Americans Reject Tailored Advertising and Three Activities That Enable It,” September 2009.

SECURITY

Opower takes data security very seriously: privacy and security are built into our platform. We take extensive measures to protect information in our possession from unauthorized access, use, loss, or modification, and insist that all of our contracted partners do the same. We won't provide personally identifiable information to any party that does not commit to the same level of care we maintain with respect to securing your data. And, we are constantly innovating to advance our security and keep abreast with new best practices.

We protect our partners’ utility data as strenuously as we protect consumer data. None of the data we custodian for our partners is ever shared with anyone without their explicit authorization.

In protecting the security of the data we maintain, Opower employs a defense-in-depth strategy, relying on a set of safeguards consistent with federal and state laws as well as industry best-practices. Our approach to security is consistent with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) risk management framework, including the recent NISTIR 7628 Guidelines for Smart Grid Cyber Security. Opower also shares expertise and best-practice knowledge as an active member of NIST’s Smart Grid Cyber Security Working Group and its Privacy Subgroup.

Power utilities will invest $4.1B in cyber security measures between now and 2018. Pike Research, “Industrial Control Systems Security,” August 2011.

DELETING DATA

Energy usage data is critical to Opower’s service. We use data to provide you with insights on your usage, and to measure and verify the effectiveness of our energy efficiency programs with utilities. We're committed to deleting all personally identifiable energy use data that we don’t need to provide our service and measure its results.

Private companies will store 44 times as much data in 2020 as they store now. McKinsey Global Institute, “Big Data: The Next Frontier for Innovation, Competition and Productivity,” May 2011.

INFRASTRUCTURE

With more than 75 utility partners, including seven of the ten largest utilities in the United States, Opower processes standard and AMI meter data for approximately half of the United States population. Each of these partnerships represents a utility’s trust in our ability to protect its customer information and we are committed to earning and building on this trust.

One way we do this is by investing in cutting-edge security infrastructure and privacy practices that are recognized by leading industry standards groups. Opower leads the industry with a TRUSTe certified privacy policy, adherence to the latest NIST standards and US-E.U. Safe Harbor Framework, SOC 1 certification for data centers and SOC 2 certification for our business processes.