First: these meters make it possible for the nanny state to impose specific usage restrictions on individual utility customers. In a normal residential situation, all the utility can see is the total demand from a number of customers who share a common feed. Now, they will be able to tell when your AC kicked on. This invites intervention to keep you from purchasing power for a variety of reasons. It is one thing when the utility is attempting to manage its load so as to deal with equipment limitations. It will be another thing entirely when it is for reasons that are rooted in liberal policies or what is considered policically correct.
Second: how long before someone hacks this network, either to “wiretap” the usage of their neighbor or to send rouge commands, such as to trigger load shedding equipment that turns off a specific customer’s hot water heater or AC? Of course, “strong laws” will forbid this. And of course, “strong laws” cannot endure that nobody will ever be the victim of such hacking.
You can bet some foreign powers already have teams of hackers reverse engineering these wonderful devices, just in case they might need the soft bombs. ;^)