Abstract A single-photon entangled state (or single-particle entangled state (SPES) in general) can offer a more secure way of encoding and processing quantum information than their multi-photon (or multi-particle) counterparts. The SPES generated via a 2D alternate quantum-walk setup from initially separable states can be either 3-way or 2-way entangled. This letter shows that the generated genuine three-way and nonlocal two-way SPES can be used as cryptographic keys to securely encode two distinct messages simultaneously. We detail the message encryption–decryption steps and show the resilience of the 3-way and 2-way SPES-based cryptographic protocols against eavesdropper attacks like intercept-and-resend and man-in-the-middle. We also detail the experimental realization of these protocols using a single photon, with the three degrees of freedom being orbital angular momentum, path, and polarization. We have proved that the protocols have unconditional security for quantum communication tasks. The ability to simultaneously encode two distinct messages using the generated SPES showcases the versatility and efficiency of the proposed cryptographic protocol. This capability could significantly improve the throughput of quantum communication systems.
Abstract A single-photon entangled state (or single-particle entangled state (SPES) in general) can offer a more secure way of encoding and processing quantum information than their multi-photon (or multi-particle) counterparts. The SPES generated via a 2D alternate quantum-walk setup from initially separable states can be either 3-way or 2-way entangled. This letter shows that the generated genuine three-way and nonlocal two-way SPES can be used as cryptographic keys to securely encode two distinct messages simultaneously. We detail the message encryption–decryption steps and show the resilience of the 3-way and 2-way SPES-based cryptographic protocols against eavesdropper attacks like intercept-and-resend and man-in-the-middle. We also detail the experimental realization of these protocols using a single photon, with the three degrees of freedom being orbital angular momentum, path, and polarization. We have proved that the protocols have unconditional security for quantum communication tasks. The ability to simultaneously encode two distinct messages using the generated SPES showcases the versatility and efficiency of the proposed cryptographic protocol. This capability could significantly improve the throughput of quantum communication systems.
Entanglement with single-particle states is advantageous in quantum technology because of the states' ability to encode and process information more securely than their multiparticle analogs. Three-way- and nonlocal two-way-entangled single-particle states are desirable in this context. Herein we generate genuine three-way entanglement from an initially separable state involving three degrees of freedom of a quantum particle, which evolves via a two-dimensional alternate quantum walk employing a resource-saving single-qubit coin. We achieve maximum possible values for the three-way entanglement quantified by the $\ensuremath{\pi}$-tangle between the three degrees of freedom. We also generate optimal nonlocal two-way entanglement, quantified by the negativity between the nonlocal position degrees of freedom of the particle. This prepared architecture using quantum walks can be experimentally realized with a photon.
Abstract We present a protocol for sending a message over a quantum channel with different layers of security that will prevent an eavesdropper from deciphering the message without being detected. The protocol has two versions where the bits are encoded in either pairs of entangled photons or separate photons. Unlike many other protocols, it requires a one-way, rather than a two-way, quantum channel and does not require a quantum memor. A quantum key is used to encrypt the message and both the key and the message are sent over the quantum channle with the same quantum encoding technique. The key is sent only if no eavesdropper is detected.
By studying the properties of the mixture of Bell state particles and single photons,in the paper we design a quantum code scheme with high coding capacity,and propose a novel quantum secure direct communication protocol with high transmission efficiency.Alice prepares Bell state particles and single photons,and divides Bell state particles into two sequences SA and SB.SB is sent to Bob for the first security check through using quantum correlation properties of particles.When the check result shows that the quantum channel is safe,by using the designed quantum code scheme, Alice encodes her classical message on the mixed quantum state sequence of Bell sequence SA and single photon sequence SS.Then,some single photons that are used for security check are re-inserted randomly into the encoded sequence,and the order of particles is rearranged to ensure checking Eve's attack.Alice sends the new sequence to Bob.Bob delays and receives it.And then,the quantum channel conducts the second-time security check.The transmission error rate is calculated,and if the error rate is lower than the tolerance threshold,the channel is safe.Bob decodes and reads Alice's message.The first security check is to determine whether quantum channel is safe.The second security check is to test whether there are eavesdroppers during information transmission.Safety analysis is done by applying the quantum information theory for the proposed protocol.The error rate introduced by Eve and the amount of information by Eve are calculated.It is shown that this pro-tocol can effectively resist measurement-resend attack,intercept-resend attack, auxiliary particle attack,denial of service attack and Trojan attack.Among them,auxiliary particle attack is analyzed in detail.The transmission efficiency and coding capacity are also analyzed.The transmission efficiency is 2,the quantum bit rate is 1,and the coding capacity is that a quantum state can encode three bits of classical messages.We also compare the proposed protocol with many existing popular protocols in the sense of efficiency,e.g.,Ping-Pong protocol, Deng F G et al.'s two-step and one-pad-time quantum secure direct communication protocol,Wang J et al.'s quantum secure direct communication protocol based on entanglement swapping and Quan D X et al.'s one-way quantum secure direct communication protocol based on single photon.It is proved that this proposed protocol has higher transmission efficiency.In addition,neither complex U operation nor entanglement swapping is used,and implementation process is simplified.However,this protocol is devoted to theoretical research of quantum secure direct communication.There are still some difficulties in the practical application.For example,the storage technology of quantum states is not mature at present.It is not easy to prepare and measure Bell state particles nor to combine them with single photons,and so on.The implementation of this protocol depends on the development of quantum technology in the future.
Quantum communication is an important branch of quantum technology. It can safely transmit private information between legitimate parties and its unconditional security is guaranteed by quantum physics. So far, deterministic secure quantum communication without entanglement usually transmits single photons in two-way quantum channels. We propose a deterministic secure quantum communication proposal, and it requires a one-way quantum channel and a classical channel. In our protocol, a sender encodes logical bits by using two conjugate bases consisting of the polarization and time-bin degrees of freedom of a photon and transmits it to a receiver over a quantum channel. Upon receiving this photon, the receiver measures it randomly in two bases and can decode the bit deterministically with the help of the sender. Any attack from eavesdroppers will be detected by the legitimate parties. Furthermore, this protocol can be implemented with linear-optic elements and single-photon detectors.
In this paper, we propose a new controlled quantum secure direct communication (CQSDC) protocol with single photons in both polarization and spatial-mode degrees of freedom. Based on the defined local collective unitary operations, the sender’s secret messages can be transmitted directly to the receiver through encoding secret messages on the particles. Only with the help of the third side, the receiver can reconstruct the secret messages. Each single photon in two degrees of freedom can carry two bits of information, so the cost of our protocol is less than others using entangled qubits. Moreover, the security of our QSDC network protocol is discussed comprehensively. It is shown that our new CQSDC protocol cannot only defend the outsider eavesdroppers’ several sorts of attacks but also the inside attacks. Besides, our protocol is feasible since the preparation and the measurement of single photon quantum states in both the polarization and the spatial-mode degrees of freedom are available with current quantum techniques.
Quantum secure direct communication (QSDC) enables direct private message transmission over quantum channels without pre-shared keys. This paper proposes a QSDC protocol based on two-step line-based quantum walks (QWs), which involves sender Alice, receiver Bob and an untrusted third party Charlie, and three stages consisting of preparing, checking quantum channel and communicating secret messages. In the first stage, Bob generates entangled states as the desired quantum channel via one-step QW and prepares decoy photons for the subsequent security checking of the quantum channel; In the second stage, Bob first sends a sequence comprising the photons from the entangled states and Bob’s decoy photons to Alice, who forwards Bob’s decoy photons along with her own decoy photons to Charlie for measurement, with Alice and Bob verifying security by comparing the measurement outcomes; In the third stage, Alice prepares a sequence of photons as coin state for encoding messages to be communicated, which along with the prepared entangled states form a quantum teleportation system, which completes the transmission of the messages under the dominance of another-step QW. Security analyses show the suggested protocol can resist against intercept-and-resend and measure-and-resend attacks, promoting the QSDC’s practicality via QW-based entanglement generation, simplified measurement operations and security checking under the assistance of the third party Charlie.