Thieves pretend to be Linky agents to extort money from you. It is therefore advisable to adopt a few rules of caution.
6,000 euros for a new Linky meter! These people show no sign or proof that they belong to a company. Once your meter has been checked, they take the opportunity to ask you for a large sum of money, 6,000 euros, to change your installation.
This is of course a lie. Those people show no signs or evidence that they belong to a company. On his account Facebookthe gendarmerie of Avallon, in Yonne, warns its inhabitants: Be vigilant and report any suspicious event to the gendarmerie by dialing 17.
Apply for a professional card
We remind you of the rules basis to avoid this type of incident. Never let a canvasser into your home, especially if you are alone. And do not forget that a technician or a public service agent sent to intervene always carries a professional card and a calling card. Ask to see them and check them carefully.
On his side, Enedis Links clarified that no telephone or physical canvassing is carried out by its teams for the moment.
Many false quality flights
Seniors are the preferred targets of false quality thefts, a term used to designate thefts carried out by identity theft. Although the modus operandi is more or less the same, there are many variants identity theft. After the false gendarmes, the nicknames plumbers or the so-called EDF employees, the so-called Linky canvassers have been abusing the naivety of certain customers for several months.
Already in June, the gendarmerie of Saint-Brieuc, in Brittany, called on users to be extremely vigilant. We have been informed that canvassers come forward on behalf of Linky to update the counter LINKY. These people have no signe nor any proof of their belonging to a company, one might read on their Facebook account. The thieves took advantage of the situation to break into the victims’ homes and seize their mobile phones.
1 million Linky meters break down due to ants every year.
Non-electrosensitive ants.https://t.co/5PBwfLEZrK— Dr Jean-Jacques Fraslin (@Fraslin) May 21, 2022
The Linky meter cut by ants
If the testimony comes from Loire-Atlantique, the phenomenon can occur anywhere as long as the Linky meter is installed outside. The forums list many cases. Michel’s case sums up the situation perfectly. My meter is installed outside, at the bottom of the garden, 90 meters from my house, he explains.
I had a Linky installed only two months ago. Since then, it no longer works and cuts our power. When I went to see if I might reset it, I was surprised to find a multitude of ants on it. The operator I called asked me to scroll down, which I did, to no avail.
A technician then came. He told me it was a very common fault caused by ants loving a component of the Linky meter and creating repeated short circuits. To say that Michel had been convinced to change the meter because Enedis had guaranteed him that with the Linky, he would never have to go to the box, everything being controlled remotely by Internet. Except the ants! The EDF subsidiary had obviously not anticipated the invasion of the meters by the colonies.
SPECIFIC PROTECTION
According to Enedis, only a thousand Linky meters out of the 34 million installed are affected each year, and they are no more attacked than their predecessors. However, at Que Choisir, we do not remember having heard of this problem before, and we are leaning towards a more attractive model.
The network manager electric ensures to intervene quickly and, if necessary, replace the meter with another, equipped with specific protection of its electronic boards. This is indeed what the technician promised Michel, without being able to tell him when he would have one to install.
