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How To Build a Quantum Eavesdropper
KentuckyFC writes "Quantum encryption is perfectly secure, in theory. In practice, however, there are loopholes. Now Japanese scientists have designed a quantum eavesdropper that exploits one of these loopholes to listen in to quantum conversations. QC's security arises from the impossibility of making a perfect copy of a quantum object without destroying it — so the sender and receiver can always tell if they've been overheard. But it turns out that an eavesdropper can make imperfect copies and use them to extract information from a quantum message without alerting sender or receiver (abstract). The Japanese design does just this. That should worry banks and government agencies that have begun to use some of the commercial quantum encryption systems now available."
but are they on trucks or in some sort of series of tubes?
IANAP, but can someone please tell me how the theoretically impossible became theoretically possible? Did the theory change, or was the math wrong, or did His Great and Wonderful Noodliness screw with the results?
If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
Okay, so you receive some imperfect data... isn't it still encrypted??
I know this isn't quite the same, but I can pull loads of data from surrounding wireless networks.. of course, it's still encrypted with WPA, so it's not of much use.
So what's the real threat?