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First Quantum Cryptographic Data Network
jdubs writes to tell us ScienceDaily is reporting that scientists at Northwestern University and BBN Technologies have demonstrated the first truly quantum cryptographic data network. From the article: "Kumar's research team recently demonstrated a new way of encrypting data that relies on both traditional algorithms and on physical principles. This QDE method, called AlphaEta, makes use of the inherent and irreducible quantum noise in laser light to enhance the security of the system and makes eavesdropping much more difficult. Unlike most other physical encryption methods, AlphaEta maintains performance on par with traditional optical communications links and is compatible with standard fiber optical networks."
This post is not insightful!
The sharks are talking to each other with their frickin' lasers! Quick, get Sony to invent a ludicrously overpriced piece of hardware for all the other colours of laser, so that we get a shortage of those too and the sharks can't get their fins on any more! ...OK, I'm done.
"This QDE method, called AlphaEta, makes use of the inherent and irreducible quantum noise in laser light to enhance the security of the system and makes eavesdropping much more difficult. Unlike most other physical encryption methods, AlphaEta maintains performance on par with traditional optical communications links and is compatible with standard fiber optical networks."
And the NSA already has a patent on it.
We know a working quantum computer, on a sufficient scale, can crack modern encryption in something like linear time, or at least better than the current exponential time. We know that no such computer exists now, or at least not on sufficient scale to enable the NSA to snoop all our encrypted traffic.
Or (tinfoil hat time) do we really? Will we know when this happens, or will it be classified and snapped up by the government? Would we notice that? (The way we did with the a-bomb -- contests were held for whose work could be classified the fastest.) Or would we only notice years later, when it's finally leaked...
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Has Harold a research team of his own?
And I Thought Kumar and his team were a bunch of stoners!
Error 2101: all your sig are belong to us
They changed the outcome of the test by checking the results!
Let the commencement BEGINULATE!
When Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier in the Bell Aerospace X-1 rocket plane, the results were kept classified by the airforce.
Is modern digital cryptography so easily broken anyway? No.
I don't mind research on quantum tunnels and so on regarding cryptography, but I really wonder: who ever needed it.
BTW, anyone need a noisy stupid mechanical donkey? Oh yea the military do. I swear this is where this is going as well. No general wants someone to sniff his porn traffic.
The article does not explain at all what quantum cryptograpy is and how it's different from the cryptograpy we all know. Ah, but here's wikipedia to the rescue http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_encryption:
Quantum cryptography uses quantum mechanics for secure communications. Unlike traditional cryptography, which employs various mathematical techniques to restrict eavesdroppers from learning the contents of encrypted messages, quantum cryptography is based on the physics of information. Eavesdropping can be viewed as measurements on a physical object -- in this case the carrier of the information. Using quantum phenomena such as quantum superpositions or quantum entanglement one can design and implement a communication system which can always detect eavesdropping. This is because measurements on the quantum carrier of information disturbs it and therefore leaves traces.
assignment != equality != identity
You can certainly use quantum "noise" to generate high-entropy keys, but how does that prevent evesdropping on a public network? It can't.
And since novbody has been able to get even two quantum gates to work, they can't be using "quantum computing" in any real sense of the word.
Or perhaps TFA is the high-entropy key? More details, or ANY details, would have been useful.
Or (tinfoil hat time) do we really? Will we know when this happens, or will it be classified and snapped up by the government?
Speaking as someone who does QC work for the government, we're a LONG way off from this. Quantum computing (unlike quantum encryption, which the article is about) is nowhere near the point of being useful for code breaking. The government is not going to want to classify this sort of work until some of the fundamental hurdles have been cleared and they just have to throw money at scaling issues. You are going to see much more progress published in scientific journals before there is any chance of the work getting classified.
I don't actually know what criteria the decison makers will use (but I bet they have been identified, at least provisionally), but I would guess that at minimum someone will have to demonstrate few-qubit fault-tolerant QC in an implementation that is considered scalable (not e.g. NMR) before anyone thinks it is worth the trouble of classifying. Until then, there is too much to be gained from open dialouge with other research groups.
Also, a huge portion of QC research is happening outside the US, so the US government would not be able to suppress it even if they wanted to.
No pedantics taken. I was about to post the same point for all the kiddies citing Neal Stephenson as their source of crypto knowledge.
I'm sick of Quantum Cryptography. Every time I try and encrypt something, this smartass time-travelling scientist guy takes over my body, kisses some girl I know, and solves one of my lifelong problems before disappearing in a flash of cartoon FX.
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
Besides, a point-to-point quantum crypto connection was done around two years ago in Europe. Also the "article" never talks about the one thing you can't do with quantum traffic: route.
"I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence or insanity but they've always worked for me" - HST
The beauty of quantum encryptions is that even the smallest things means something different to everyone.
The basis of the encryption is simple. The data goes inside a plain cryptumbular box, and is locked with a quantum key. The key's signature can be detected by any decrypter, and the user is asked to use a C code to open it.
The C code is done differenlty by everyone, and does not deserve any specific comment. The obfuscation is awarded on the quantus anum, and the results are easily availible.
After that, the user can take the key and open the lock, and if the frame of reference is appropriate, the data will be readable. It's pretty much black and white.
Have you read my journal today?
BBN's page for quantum crypto
I'm wondered how secure this realy is.
I mean we know a lot of physics but still not everything there is to know. This especialy accounts for quantum physics, it wouldnt surprice my if someone in the future will be able to find some kind of physic trick and know the quantum states of distant particles. So agree it is secure currently but i am wondered for howlong it will be that way.
(don't say this would never be possible as our current physic model isn't yet finished..)
Alpha Eta... is that some sort of really secret fraternity or something? Can't they come up with a better name?