We propose a cryptographic scheme that is deterministic: Alice sends single photons to Bob, and each and every photon detected supplies one key bit -- no photon is wasted. This is in marked contrast to other schemes in which a random process decides whether the next photon sent will contribute to the key or not. The determinism is achieved by preparing the photons in two-qubit states, rather than the one-qubit states used in conventional schemes. In particular, we consider the realistic situation in which one qubit is the photon polarization, the other a spatial alternative. Further, we show how one can exploit the deterministic nature for direct secure communication, that is: without the need for establishing a shared key first.
Based on an EPR pair of qubits and allowing asymptotically secure key distribution, a secure communication protocol is presented. Bob sends either of the EPR pair qubits to Alice. Alice receives the travel qubit. Then she can encode classical information by local unitary operations on this travel qubit. Alice send the qubit back to Bob. Bob can get Alice's information by measurement on the two photons in Bell operator basis. If Eve in line, she has no access to Bob's home qubit. All her operations are restricted to the travel qubit. In order to find out which opeartion Alice performs, Eve's op…
Recently, Hwang et al. [Eur. Phys. J. D. 61, 785 (2011)] and Yuan et al. [Int. J. Theo. Phys. 50, 2403 (2011)] have proposed two efficient protocols of secure quantum communication using 3-qubit and 4-qubit symmetric W state respectively. These two dense coding based protocols are generalized and their efficiencies are considerably improved. Simple bounds on the qubit efficiency of deterministic secure quantum communication (DSQC) and quantum secure direct communication (QSDC) protocols are obtained and it is shown that dense coding is not essential for designing of maximally efficient DSQC an…
A scheme for secure multiparty quantum summation was proposed by Run-hau Shi et al.,(SCIENTIFIC REPORTS, 6:19655, DOI:10.1038/srep19655). IBM Corporation has released a superconductivity based 5-qubit quantum computer named "Quantum Experience" and placed it on "cloud". In this paper we take advantage of the online availability of this real quantum processor(ibmqx2) and carry out the above protocol that has never been experimentally demonstrated earlier. Here, we set up experiments for secure quantum summation of one-qubit secret states . Besides, we propose a protocol for square and cubic sum…
In secure quantum communication protocols, a set of single qubits prepared using 2 or more mutually unbiased bases or a set of $n$-qubit ($n\geq2$) entangled states of a particular form are usually used to form a verification string which is subsequently used to detect traces of eavesdropping. The qubits that form a verification string are referred to as decoy qubits, and there exists a large set of different quantum states that can be used as decoy qubits. In the absence of noise, any choice of decoy qubits provides equivalent security. In this paper, we examine such equivalence for noisy env…
We propose two deterministic secure quantum communication (DSQC) protocols employing three-qubit GHZ-like states and five-qubit Brown states as quantum channels for secure transmission of information in units of two bits and three bits using multipartite teleportation schemes developed here. In these schemes, the sender's capability in selecting quantum channels and the measuring bases leads to improved qubit efficiency of the protocols.
We study the problem of secret key distillation from bipartite states in the scenario where Alice and Bob can only perform measurements at the single-copy level and classically process the obtained outcomes. Even with these limitations, secret bits can be asymptotically distilled by the honest parties from any two-qubit entangled state, under any individual attack. Our results point out a complete equivalence between two-qubit entanglement and secure key distribution: a key can be established through a one-qubit channel if and only if it allows to distribute entanglement. These results can be …
A novel communication protocol based on an entangled pair of qubits is presented, allowing secure direct communication from one party to another without the need for a shared secret key. Since the information is transferred in a deterministic manner, no qubits have to be discarded and every qubit carries message information. The security of the transfer against active and passive eavesdropping attacks is provided. The detection rate of active attacks is at least 25%. The protocol works with a quantum efficiency of 1 bit per qubit transmitted.
We present a subtle idea to economically improve message-unilaterally-transmitted quantum secure direct communication (QSDC) protocols to realize two-way secure direct communication.
Quantum secure data transfer is an important topic for quantum cyber security. We propose a scheme to realize quantum secure data transfer in the basis of quantum secure direct communication (QSDC). In this proposal, the transmitted data is encoded in the pulse shape of a single optical qubit, which is emitted from a trapped atom owned by the sender and received by the receiver with another trapped atom. The encoding process can be implemented with high fidelity by controlling the time-dependent driving pulse on the trapped atom to manipulate the Rabi frequency in accordance with the target pu…
We consider the task of secure multi-party distributed quantum computation on a quantum network. We propose a protocol based on quantum error correction which reduces the number of necessary qubits. That is, each of the $n$ nodes in our protocol requires an operational workspace of $n^2+Θ(s) n$ qubits, as opposed to previously shown $Ω\big((n^3+n^2s^2)\log n\big)$ qubits, where $s$ is a security parameter. To achieve universal computation, we develop a distributed procedure for verifying magic states based on magic state distillation and statistical testing of randomly selected states. This al…
The demonstration of quantum teleportation of a photonic qubit from Alice to Bob usually relies on data conditioned on detection at Bob's location. I show that Bohm's Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) paradox can be used to verify that the quantum benchmark for qubit teleportation has been reached, without postselection. This is possible for scenarios insensitive to losses at the generation station, and with efficiencies of $η_{B}>1/3$ for the teleportation process. The benchmark is obtained, if it is shown that Bob can {}"steer" Alice's record of the qubit as stored by Charlie. EPR steering inequ…
In single-qubit quantum secret sharing, a secret is shared between N parties via manipulation and measurement of one qubit at a time. Each qubit is sent to all N parties in sequence; the secret is encoded in the first participant's preparation of the qubit state and the subsequent participants' choices of state rotation or measurement basis. We present a protocol for single-qubit quantum secret sharing using polarization entanglement of photon pairs produced in type-I spontaneous parametric downconversion. We investigate the protocol's security against eavesdropping attack under common experim…
We discuss quantum position verification (QPV) protocols in which the verifiers create and send single-qubit states to the prover. QPV protocols using single-qubit states are known to be insecure against adversaries that share a small number of entangled qubits. We introduce QPV protocols that are practically secure: they only require single-qubit states from each of the verifiers, yet their security is broken if the adversaries share an impractically large number of shared entangled qubits. These protocols are a modification of known QPV protocols in which we include a classical random oracle…
Random generation and confidential distribution of cryptographic keys are fundamental building blocks of secure communication. Using quantum states in which the transmitted quantum bit is entangled with a stationary memory quantum bit allows the secure generation and distribution of keys to be based on fundamental properties of quantum mechanics. At the same time, the reach of secure communication networks can be enhanced, in particular, since this architecture would be compatible with quantum repeaters which are an integral part for scaling quantum networks. Here, we realize a true single-pho…
In this paper, we generalize the secure quantum information exchange (SQIE) protocol, originally proposed by the authors [J. Phys. B: At. Mol. Opt. Phys. 44 (2011) 115504] for secure exchange of one qubit information with each of Alice and Bob, to the case of secure exchange of quantum information of arbitrary qubits with Alice and Bob. We also discuss security of the original and generalized SQIE protocols with respect to the number of qubits with controller, Charlie.
We presen a secure direct communication protocol by using step-split Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) pair. In this communication protocol, Alice first sends one qubit of an EPR pair to Bob. Bob sends a receipt signal to Alice through public channel when he receives Alice's first qubit. Alice performs her encoding operations on the second qubit and sends this qubit to Bob. Bob performs a Bell-basis measurement to draw Alice's information. The security of this protocol is based on `High fidelity implies low entropy'. If Eve want to eavesdrop Alice's information, she has to attack both qubits of th…
In this letter a deterministic secure direct bidirectional communication protocol is proposed by using the quantum entanglement and local unitary operations on one photon of the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) photon pair.
We propose a new Quantum Key Distribution method in which Alice sends pairs of qubits to Bob, each in one of four possible states. Bob uses one qubit to generate a secure key and the other to generate an auxiliary key. For each pair he randomly decides which qubit to use for which key. The auxiliary key has to be added to Bob's secure key in order to match Alice's secure key. This scheme provides an additional layer of security over the standard BB84 protocol.
In this paper, a three party controlled quantum secure direct communication protocol based on GHZ like state is proposed. In this scheme, the receiver can obtain the sender s two secret bits under the permission of the controller. By using entanglement swapping, no qubits carrying secret messages are transmitted. Therefore, if the perfect quantum channel is used, the protocol is completely secure. The motivation behind utilizing GHZ like state as a quantum channel is that if a qubit is lost in the GHZ like state the other two qubits are still entangled. The proposed protocol improves the effic…
Several theoretical Deterministic Secure Direct Bidirectional Communication protocols are generalized to improve their capacities by introducing the superdense-coding in the case of high-dimension quantum states.
The effect of noise on various protocols of secure quantum communication has been studied. Specifically, we have investigated the effect of amplitude damping, phase damping, squeezed generalized amplitude damping, Pauli type as well as various collective noise models on the protocols of quantum key distribution, quantum key agreement,quantum secure direct quantum communication and quantum dialogue. From each type of protocol of secure quantum communication, we have chosen two protocols for our comparative study; one based on single qubit states and the other one on entangled states. The compar…
Semi-quantum protocols that allow some of the users to remain classical are proposed for a large class of problems associated with secure communication and secure multiparty computation. Specifically, first time semi-quantum protocols are proposed for key agreement, controlled deterministic secure communication and dialogue, and it is shown that the semi-quantum protocols for controlled deterministic secure communication and dialogue can be reduced to semi-quantum protocols for e-commerce and private comparison (socialist millionaire problem), respectively. Complementing with the earlier propo…
Quantum secure direct communication is the direct communication of secret messages without first producing a shared secret key. It maybe used in some urgent circumstances. Here we propose a quantum secure direct communication protocol using single photons. The protocol uses batches of single photons prepared randomly in one of four different states. These single photons serve as a one-time-pad which are used directly to encode the secret messages in one communication process. We also show that it is unconditionally secure. The protocol is feasible with present-day technique.
The commodity-based cryptography is an alternative approach to realize conventionally impossible cryptographic primitives such as unconditionally secure bit-commitment by consuming pre-established correlation between distrustful participants. A unit of such classical correlation is known as the one-time table (OTT). In this paper, we introduce a new example besides quantum key distribution in which quantum correlation is useful for cryptography. We propose a scheme for unconditionally secure qubit-commitment, a quantum cryptographic primitive forbidden by the recently proven no-masking theorem…
We show a deterministic secure direct communication protocol using single qubit in mixed state. The security of this protocol is based on the security proof of BB84 protocol. It can be realized with current technologies.
We present a scheme for three-party simultaneous quantum secure direct communication by using EPR pairs. In the scheme, three legitimate parties can simultaneously exchange their secret messages. It is also proved to be secure against the intercept-and-resend attack, the disturbance attack and the entangled-and-measure attack.
We present a quantum secure direct communication protocol where the channels are not maximally entangled states. The communication parties utilize decoy photons to check eavesdropping. After ensuring the security of the quantum channel, the sender encodes the secret message and transmits it to the receiver by using Controlled-NOT operation and von Neumann measurement. The protocol is simple and realizable with present technology. We also show the protocol is secure for noisy quantum channel.
In the paper [Phys. Rev. A \textbf{69}, 052319 (2004)], a quantum direct communication protocol is proposed which is claimed to be unconditionally secure even for the case of a noisy channel. We show that this is not the case by giving an undetectable attack scheme.
In light of Deng-Long-Liu's two-step secret direct communication protocol using the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen pair block [Phys. Rev. A {\bf 68}, 042317 (2003)], by introducing additional local operations for encoding, we propose a brand-new secure direct communication protocol, in which two legitimate users can simultaneously transmit their different secret messages to each other in a set of quantum communication device.
Extending the eavesdropping strategy devised by Zhang, Li and Guo [Phys. Rev. A 63, 036301 (2001)], we show that the multiparty quantum communication protocol based on entanglement swapping, which was proposed by Cabello [quant-ph/0009025], is not secure. We modify the protocol so that entanglement swapping can secure multiparty quantum communication, such as multiparty quantum key distribution and quantum secret sharing of classical information, and show that the modified protocol is secure against the Zhang-Li-Guo's strategy for eavesdropping as well as the basic intercept-resend attack.
Most of the quantum secure direct communication protocol needs a pre-established secure quantum channel. Only after insuring the security of quantum channel, could the sender encode the secret message and send them to the receiver through the secure channel. In this paper, we present a quantum secure direct communication protocol using Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen pairs. It is not necessary for the present protocol to insure the security of quantum channel before transmitting the secret message. In the present protocol, all Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen pairs are used to transmit the secret message excep…
Secure communication based on message encryption might be performed by combining the message with controlled noise (called pseudo-noise) as performed in Spread-Spectrum communication used presently in Wi-Fi and Smartphone Telecommunication systems. Quantum communication based on entanglement is another route for securing communications as demonstrated by several important experiments described in this work. The central role played by the photon in unifying the description of Classical and Quantum noise as major ingredients of secure communication systems is highlighted and described on the bas…
This paper presents a prepare-and-measure scheme using $N$-dimensional quantum particles as information carriers where $N$ is a prime power. One of the key ingredients used to resist eavesdropping in this scheme is to depolarize all Pauli errors introduced to the quantum information carriers. Using the Shor-Preskill-type argument, we prove that this scheme is unconditionally secure against all attacks allowed by the laws of quantum physics. For $N = 2^n > 2$, each information carrier can be replaced by $n$ entangled qubits. In this case, there is a family of eavesdropping attacks on which no u…
We discuss the four requirements for a real point-to-point quantum secure direct communication (QSDC) first, and then present two efficient QSDC network schemes with an N ordered Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen pairs. Any one of the authorized users can communicate another one on the network securely and directly.
We propose the schemes of quantum secure direct communication (QSDC) based on secret transmitting order of particles. In these protocols, the secret transmitting order of particles ensures the security of communication, and no secret messages are leaked even if the communication is interrupted for security. This strategy of security for communication is also generalized to quantum dialogue. It not only ensures the unconditional security but also improves the efficiency of communication.
In this letter we propose a theoretical deterministic secure direct bidirectional quantum communication protocol by using swapping quantum entanglement and local unitary operations, in which the quantum channel for photon transmission can be discarded, hence any attack with or without eavesdropping or even the destructive attack without scruple is impossible.
It has been found that the signal can be encoded in the choice of the measurement basis of one of the communicating parties, while the outcomes of the measurement are irrelevant for the communication and therefore may be discarded. The proposed protocol was novel and interesting, but it wasn't secure for communication. The eavesdropper can obtain the information without being detected. We utilize the outcomes of the measurement to propose a secure communication protocol. And the error correction code is used to increase the fault tolerance in the noise.
Quantum communication holds promise for absolutely security in secret message transmission. Quantum secure direct communication is an important mode of the quantum communication in which secret messages are securely communicated over a quantum channel directly. It has become one of the hot research areas in the last decade, and offers both high security and instantaneousness in communication. It is also a basic cryptographic primitive for constructing other quantum communication tasks such as quantum authentication, quantum dialogue and so on. Here we report the first experimental demonstratio…
We demonstrate theoretically and experimentally that secure communication using intermediate-energy (mesoscopic) coherent states is possible. Our scheme is different from previous quantum cryptographic schemes in that a short secret key is explicitly used and in which quantum noise hides both the bit and the key. This encryption scheme can be optically amplified. New avenues are open to secure communications at high speeds in fiber-optic or free-space channels.
We show an improved ping-pong protocol which is based on the protocol showed by Kim Bostrom and Timo Felbinger [Phys. Rev. Lett. 89, 187902 (2002); quant-ph/0209040]. We show that our protocol is asymptotically secure key distribution and quasisecure direct communication using a single photon resource. And this protocol can be can be carried out with great efficiency and speed using today's technology.
Recently, Cao et al. proposed a new quantum secure direct communication scheme using W state. In their scheme, the error rate introduced by an eavesdropper who takes intercept-resend attack, is only 8.3%. Actually, their scheme is just a quantum key distribution scheme because the communication parties first create a shared key and then encrypt the secret message using one-time pad. We then present a quantum secure communication scheme using three-qubit W state. In our scheme, the error rate is raised to 25% and it is not necessary for the present scheme to use alternative measurement or Bell …
A novel secure communication protocol is presented, based on an entangled pair of qubits and allowing asymptotically secure key distribution and quasi-secure direct communication. Since the information is transferred in a deterministic manner, no qubits have to be discarded. The transmission of information is instantaneous, i.e. the information can be decoded during the transmission. The security against arbitrary eavesdropping attacks is provided. In case of eavesdropping attacks with full information gain, the detection rate is 50% per control transmission. The experimental realization of th…
A multipartner secure direct communication protocol is presented, using quantum nonlocality. Security of this protocol is based on `High fidelity implies low entropy'. When the entanglement was successfully distributed, anyone of the multipartner can send message secretly by using local operation and reliable public channel. Since message transfered only by using local operation and public channel after entanglement successfully distributed, so this protocol can protect the communication against destroying-travel-qubit-type attack.
Communication security with quantum key distribution has been one of the important features of quantum information theory. A novel concept of secured direct communication has been the next step forward without the need to establish any shared secret key. The present paper is based on the ping-pong protocol with three particle GHZ state as the initial state where the receiver can simultaneously receive information from two parties. Possible eavesdropping on the travelling particle has been examined.
In this work we introduce a novel QKD protocol capable of smoothly transitioning, via user-tuneable parameter, from classical to semi-quantum in order to help understand the effect of quantum communication resources on secure key distribution. We perform an information theoretic security analysis of this protocol to determine what level of "quantumness" is sufficient to achieve security, and we discover some rather interesting properties of this protocol along the way.
In this paper, a bidirectional quantum teleportation protocol based on Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) pairs and entanglement swapping is proposed. In this scheme, two users can simultaneously transmit an unknown single-qubit state to each other. The implementation of the proposed scheme is easier in experiment as compared to previous work. By utilizing this bidirectional quantum teleportation protocol, a bidirectional quantum secure direct communication scheme without carrying secret message is presented. Therefore, in the case of using perfect quantum channel, the protocol is completely secure…
We present a three-party simultaneous quantum secure direct communication (QSDC) scheme by using Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ) states. This scheme can be directly generalized to $N$-party QSDC by using $n$-particle GHZ states. We show that the many-party simultaneous QSDC scheme is secure not only against the intercept-and-resend attack but also against the disturbance attack.
Quantum secure direct communication (QSDC) is an important quantum communication branch, which realizes the secure information transmission directly without encryption and decryption processes. Recently, two table-top experiments have demonstrated the principle of QSDC. Here, we report the first long-distance QSDC experiment, including the security test, information encoding, fiber transmission and decoding. After the fiber transmission of 0.5 km, quantum state fidelities of the two polarization entangled Bell states are 91% and 88%, respectively, which are used for information coding. We theo…
In search of a quantum key distribution scheme that could stand up for more drastic eavesdropping attack, I discover a prepare-and-measure scheme using $N$-dimensional quantum particles as information carriers where $N$ is a prime power. Using the Shor-Preskill-type argument, I prove that this scheme is unconditional secure against all attacks allowed by the laws of quantum physics. Incidentally, for $N = 2^n > 2$, each information carrier can be replaced by $n$ entangled qubits. And in this case, I discover an eavesdropping attack on which no unentangled-qubit-based prepare-and-measure quantu…
A multi-step quantum secure direct communication protocol using blocks of multi-particle maximally entangled state is proposed. In this protocol, the particles in a Green-Horne-Zeilinger state are sent from Alice to Bob in batches in several steps. It has the advantage of high efficiency and high source capacity.
We present a controlled secure direct communication protocol by using Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ) entangled state via swapping quantum entanglement and local unitary operations. Since messages transferred only by using local operations and a public channel after entangled states are successfully distributed, this protocol can protect the communication against a destroying-travel-qubit-type attack. This scheme can also be generalized to a multi-party control system.
In a recent letter, Barbosa et al [PRL 90, 227901(2003)] claim that secure communication is possible with bright coherent pulses, by using quantum noise to hide the data from an eavesdropper. We show here that the secrecy in the scheme of Barbosa et al is unrelated to quantum noise, but rather derives from the secret key that sender and receiver share beforehand.
We demonstrate that secure communication using coherent states is possible. The optimal eavesdropping strategy for an M-ry ciphering scheme shows that the minimum probability of error in a measurement for bit determination can be made arbitrarily close to the pure guessing value P_e=1/2. This ciphering scheme can be optically amplified without degrading the security level. New avenues are open to secure communications at high speeds in fiber-optic or free-space channels.
As one of the most prominent subfields of quantum communication research, remote state preparation (RSP) plays a crucial role in quantum networks. Here we present a deterministic remote state preparation scheme to prepare an arbitrary two-qubit state via a seven-qubit entangled channel created from Borras \emph{et al.} state. Quantum noises are inherent to each and every protocol for quantum communication that is currently in use, putting the integrity of quantum communication systems and their dependability at risk. The initial state of the system was a pure quantum state, but as soon as ther…
Recently, Hassanpour and Houshmand have proposed a protocol of controlled deterministic secure quantum communication (Quant. Info. Process, DOI 10.1007/s11128-014-0866-z (2014)). The authors compared the efficiency of their protocol with that of two other existing protocols and claimed that their protocol is efficient. Here, we have shown that the efficiency of Hassanpour Houshmand (HH) protocol is not high, and there exist several approaches through which more efficient protocols for the same task can be designed. To establish this point, we have proposed an efficient protocol of controlled d…
We report an experimental implementation of free-space quantum secure direct communication based on single photons. The quantum communication scheme uses phase encoding, and the asymmetric Mach-Zehnder interferometer is optimized so as to automatically compensate phase drift of the photons during their transitions over the free-space medium. An information transmission rate of 500 bps over a 10-meter free space with a mean quantum bit error rate of 0.49%$\pm$0.27% is achieved. The security is analyzed under the scenario that Eve performs collective attack and photon number splitting collective…
Based on the two-step protocol [Phys. Rev. A68(03)042317], we propose a $(n,n)$-threshold multiparty quantum secret sharing protocol of secure direct communication. In our protocol only all the sharers collaborate can the sender's secure direct communication message be extracted. We show a variant version of this protocol based on the variant two-step protocol. This variant version can considerably reduce the realization difficulty in experiment. In contrast to the use of multi-particle GHZ states in the case that the sharer number is larger than 3, the use and identification of Bell states ar…
Using quantum mechanics, secure direct communication between distant parties can be performed. Over a noisy quantum channel, quantum privacy amplification is a necessary step to ensure the security of the message. In this paper, we present a quantum privacy amplification scheme for quantum secure direct communication using single photons. The quantum privacy amplification procedure contains two control-not gates and a Hadamard gate. After the unitary gate operations, a measurement is performed and one photon is retained. The retained photon carries the state information of the discarded photon…
