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Quantum Encryption Explained

Posted by Hemos on from the sometimes-it's-encrypted-like-this-sometimes-like-this dept.

angelos writes "New Scientist Magazine has an article discussing the theories of Quantum Encryption. Short and not too complicated an article, but makes for some interesting reading. " Very cool overview of the subject - takes a look at the potential future of encryption and why the curent system of encryption will not last.

1 of 126 comments (clear)

  1. No. by aheitner · · Score: 5

    The problem of how to break something like RSA is a mathematical one: either some operation is easy to do in one direction and hard to do in another, or it's in fact easy in both directions. Factoring is one example of such an operation.

    The proposed quantum scheme relieson the fact that whether a photon will pass through a filter polarized at 45 degrees to the photon's own aligment is random at a quantum level, eg. can't be determined. Eve is screwed at a fundamental physics level. The only thing that could crack this would be major changes in our understanding of particle physics.

    It's open to debate whether this is more or less likely than finding a quick factoring method (or in the case of RSA, a quick way to find Phi(n) from n). . .