Secure Communication Using Qubits

A two-layer quantum protocol for secure transmission of data using qubits is presented. The protocol is an improvement over the BB84 QKD protocol. BB84, in conjunction with the one-time pad algorithm, has been shown to be unconditionally secure. However it suffers from two drawbacks: (1) Its security relies on the assumption that Alice’s qubit source is perfect in the sense that it does not inadvertently emit multiple copies of the same qubit. A multi-qubit emission attack can be launched if this assumption is violated. (2) BB84 cannot transfer predetermined keys; the keys it can distribute are generated in the process. Our protocol does not have these drawbacks. As in BB84, our protocol requires an authenticated public channel so as to detect an intruder’s interaction with the quantum channel, but unlike in symmetric-key cryptography, the confidentiality of transmitted data does not rely on a shared secret key.