We show that a family of quantum authentication protocols introduced in [Barnum et al., FOCS 2002] can be used to construct a secure quantum channel and additionally recycle all of the secret key if the message is successfully authenticated, and recycle part of the key if tampering is detected. We give a full security proof that constructs the secure channel given only insecure noisy channels and a shared secret key. We also prove that the number of recycled key bits is optimal for this family of protocols, i.e., there exists an adversarial strategy to obtain all non-recycled bits. Previous works recycled less key and only gave partial security proofs, since they did not consider all possible distinguishers (environments) that may be used to distinguish the real setting from the ideal secure quantum channel and secret key resource. These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
We show that a family of quantum authentication protocols introduced in [Barnum et al., FOCS 2002] can be used to construct a secure quantum channel and additionally recycle all of the secret key if the message is successfully authenticated, and recycle part of the key if tampering is detected. We give a full security proof that constructs the secure channel given only insecure noisy channels and a shared secret key. We also prove that the number of recycled key bits is optimal for this family of protocols, i.e., there exists an adversarial strategy to obtain all non-recycled bits. Previous works recycled less key and only gave partial security proofs, since they did not consider all possible distinguishers (environments) that may be used to distinguish the real setting from the ideal secure quantum channel and secret key resource. These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
Assuming an insecure quantum channel and an authenticated classical channel, we propose an unconditionally secure scheme for encrypting classical messages under a shared key, where attempts to eavesdrop the ciphertext can be detected. If no eavesdropping is detected, we can securely re-use the entire key for encrypting new messages. If eavesdropping is detected, we must discard a number of key bits corresponding to the length of the message, but can re-use almost all of the rest. We show this is essentially optimal. Thus, provided the adversary does not interfere (too much) with the quantum channel, we can securely send an arbitrary number of message bits, independently of the length of the initial key. Moreover, the key-recycling mechanism only requires one-bit feedback. While ordinary quantum key distribution with a classical one time pad could be used instead to obtain a similar functionality, this would need more rounds of interaction and more communication.
Quantum information is a valuable resource which can be encrypted in order to protect it. We consider the size of the one-time pad that is needed to protect quantum information in a number of cases. The situation is dramatically different from the classical case: we prove that one can recycle the one-time pad without compromising security. The protocol for recycling relies on detecting whether eavesdropping has occurred, and further relies on the fact that information contained in the encrypted quantum state cannot be fully accessed. We prove the security of recycling rates when authentication of quantum states is accepted, and when it is rejected. We note that recycling schemes respect a general law of cryptography which we introduce relating the size of private keys, sent qubits, and encrypted messages. We discuss applications for encryption of quantum information in light of the resources needed for teleportation. Potential uses include the protection of resources such as entanglement and the memory of quantum computers. We also introduce another application: encrypted secret sharing and find that one can even reuse the private key that is used to encrypt a classical message. In a number of cases, one finds that the amount of private key needed for authentication or protection is smaller than in the general case.
Barnum, Crepeau, Gottesman, Tapp, and Smith (quant-ph/0205128) proposed methods for authentication of quantum messages. The first method is an interactive protocol (TQA') based on teleportation. The second method is a noninteractive protocol (QA) in which the sender first encrypts the message using a protocol QEnc and then encodes the quantum ciphertext with an error correcting code chosen secretly from a set (a purity test code (PTC)). Encryption was shown to be necessary for authentication. We augment the protocol QA with an extra step which recycles the entire encryption key provided QA accepts the message. We analyze the resulting integrated protocol for quantum authentication and key generation, which we call QA+KG. Our main result is a proof that QA+KG is universal composably (UC) secure in the Ben-Or-Mayers model (quant-ph/0409062). More specifically, this implies the UC-security of (a) QA, (b) recycling of the encryption key in QA, and (c) key-recycling of the encryption scheme QEnc by appending PTC. For an m-qubit message, encryption requires 2m bits of key; but PTC can be performed using only O(log m) + O(log e) bits of key for probability of failure e. Thus, we reduce the key required for both QA and QEnc, from linear to logarithmic net consumption, at the expense of one bit of back communication which can happen any time after the conclusion of QA and before reusing the key. UC-security of QA also extends security to settings not obvious from quant-ph/0205128. Our security proof structure is inspired by and similar to that of quant-ph/0205128, reducing the security of QA to that of TQA'. In the process, we define UC-secure entanglement, and prove the UC-security of the entanglement generating protocol given in quant-ph/0205128, which could be of independent interest.
Authentication is a well-studied area of classical cryptography: a sender A and a receiver B sharing a classical secret key want to exchange a classical message with the guarantee that the message has not been modified or replaced by a dishonest party with control of the communication line. In this paper we study the authentication of messages composed of quantum states. We give a formal definition of authentication in the quantum setting. Assuming A and B have access to an insecure quantum channel and share a secret, classical random key, we provide a non-interactive scheme that enables A to both encrypt and authenticate an m qubit message by encoding it into m+s qubits, where the error probability decreases exponentially in the security parameter s. The scheme requires a secret key of size 2m+O(s). To achieve this, we give a highly efficient protocol for testing the purity of shared EPR pairs. It has long been known that learning information about a general quantum state will necessarily disturb it. We refine this result to show that such a disturbance can be done with few side effects, allowing it to circumvent cryptographic protections. Consequently, any scheme to authenticate quantum messages must also encrypt them. In contrast, no such constraint exists classically. This reasoning has two important consequences: It allows us to give a lower bound of 2m key bits for authenticating m qubits, which makes our protocol asymptotically optimal. Moreover, we use it to show that digitally signing quantum states is impossible.
Quantum key distribution (QKD) enables unconditionally secure communication between distinct parties using a quantum channel and an authentic public channel. Reducing the portion of quantum-generated secret keys, that is consumed during the authentication procedure, is of significant importance for improving the performance of QKD systems. In the present work, we develop a lightweight authentication protocol for QKD based on a `ping-pong' scheme of authenticity check for QKD. An important feature of this scheme is that the only one authentication tag is generated and transmitted during each of the QKD post-processing rounds. For the tag generation purpose, we design an unconditionally secure procedure based on the concept of key recycling. The procedure is based on the combination of almost universal2polynomial hashing, XOR universal2Toeplitz hashing, and one-time pad (OTP) encryption. We demonstrate how to minimize both the length of the recycled key and the size of the authentication key, that is required for OTP encryption. As a result, in real case scenarios, the portion of quantum-generated secret keys that is consumed for the authentication purposes is below 1%. Finally, we provide a security analysis of the full quantum key growing process in the framework of universally composable security.
Quantum Key Recycling aims to re-use the keys employed in quantum encryption and quantum authentication schemes. QKR protocols can achieve better round complexity than Quantum Key Distribution. We consider a QKR protocol that works with qubits, as opposed to high-dimensional qudits. A security proof was given by Fehr and Salvail in the case where there is practically no noise. A high-rate scheme for the noisy case was proposed by \v{S}kori\'{c} and de Vries, based on eight-state encoding. However, a security proof was not given. In this paper we introduce a protocol modification and provide a security proof. The modified protocol has high rate not only for 8-state encoding, but also 6-state and BB84 encoding. Our proof is based on a bound on the trace distance between the real quantum state of the system and a state in which the keys are completely secure. It turns out that the rate is higher than suggested by previous results. Asymptotically the rate equals the rate of Quantum Key Distribution with one-way postprocessing.