Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Log inSign up
Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Blog
Job Board
Q3AS

© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

TermsPrivacyLegal Notice

Proceedings of the IEEE

Secret-Key Distribution Based on Bounded Observability

Jun Muramatsu, Kazuyuki Yoshimura, Peter Davis, Atsushi Uchida, Takahisa Harayama

Published Sep 14, 2015• 22 citations
Publisher

Abstract

This paper reviews an approach to secret-key distribution based on the bounded observability (BO) model. First, the information-theoretic framework of secret-key agreement from a correlated random source is reviewed. Next, the BO model is introduced. In the context of this model, the BO condition is presented as a necessary and sufficient condition for the possibility of secret-key distribution. This condition describes limits on the information obtained by observation of a random object, and models the practical difficulty of completely observing random physical phenomena. Finally, an implementation of secret-key distribution based on BO in an optical fiber system is described.

DOI
10.1109/jproc.2015.2462837

Related papers

A Review of Secret Key Distribution Based on Bounded Observability

Jun Muramatsu

Abstract Secret key distribution is a technique for a sender and a receiver to share a secret key, which is not known by any eavesdropper, when they share no common secret information in advance. By using this technique, the sender and the receiver can transmit a message securely in the sense that the message remains secret from any eavesdropper. We introduced a secret key distribution based on the Bounded Observability (Muramatsu et al. 2010, 2013, 2015), which provides a necessary and sufficient condition for the possibility of secret key distribution. This condition describes limits on the information obtained by observation of a random object, and models the practical difficulty of completely observing random physical phenomena.

Mathematics for industry•Oct 22, 2020•0 citations

Pairwise Secret Key Agreement based on Location-derived Common Randomness

Somayeh Salimi, Panos Papadimitratos

A source model of key sharing between three users is considered in which each pair of them wishes to agree on a secret key hidden from the remaining user. There are rate-limited public channels for communications between the users. We give an inner bound on the secret key capacity region in this framework. Moreover, we investigate a practical setup in which localization information of the users as the correlated observations are exploited to share pairwise keys between the users. The inner and outer bounds of the key capacity region are analyzed in this setup for the case of i.i.d. Gaussian observations.

arXiv:1512.08652•Dec 29, 2015•2 citations

Information-Theoretic Key Agreement of Multiple Terminals—Part I

Amin Gohari, Venkat Anantharam

We study the problem of information-theoretically secure secret key agreement under the well-known source model and channel model. In both of these models, multiple terminals wish to create a shared secret key that is secure from a passive eavesdropper. The terminals have access to a noiseless public communication channel and an additional resource that depends on the model. In the source model, the resource is an external source that repeatedly beams correlated randomness to the terminals; whereas in the channel model, the resource is a secure but noisy discrete memoryless broadcast channel. We derive new lower and upper bounds on the secret key capacity under both the source model and the channel model. The technique used for deriving our bound for the source model is to find certain properties of functions of joint probability distributions which, applied to the joint distribution of the source, will imply that they dominate the secret key capacity, and then prove the bound by a verification argument. A similar technique is used for the channel model. Finally, we also define a problem of communication for omniscience by a neutral observer and establish the equivalence between this new problem and the problem of secret key agreement. This generalizes an earlier result of Csiszár and Narayan.

IEEE Transactions on Information Theory•Jul 21, 2010•130 citations

Secure Key Distribution Using Correlated Randomness in Lasers Driven by Common Random Light

Kazuyuki Yoshimura, Jun Muramatsu, Peter Davis +5 more

We propose a secure key distribution scheme based on correlated physical randomness in remote optical scramblers driven by common random light. The security of the scheme depends on the practical difficulty of completely observing random optical phenomena. We describe a particular realization using the synchronization of semiconductor lasers injected with common light of randomly varying phase. We experimentally demonstrate the feasibility of the scheme over a distance of 120 km.

Physical Review Letters•Feb 14, 2012•174 citations

Pairwise secret key agreement using the source common randomness

Somayeh Salimi, Mikael Skoglund, Mahmoud Salmasizadeh +1 more

A secret key agreement setup between three users is considered in which each pair of them wishes to agree on a secret key hidden from the remaining user. The three users observe i.i.d. outputs of correlated sources and there is a noiseless public channel from each user for communication to the others. In this setup, inner and outer bounds of the secret key capacity region is derived. Moreover, some special cases are obtained in which the inner bound coincides the explicit outer bound. Also a binary-erasure example is presented through which the results are examined.

International Symposium on Wireless Communication Systems•Aug 1, 2012•3 citations

Information Theoretic Secrecy

Abbas El Gamal, Young-Han Kim

Confidentiality of information is a key consideration in many networking applications, including e-commerce, online banking, and intelligence operations. How can information be communicated reliably to the legitimate users, while keeping it secret from eavesdroppers? How does such a secrecy constraint on communication affect the limits on information flow in the network? In this chapter, we study these questions under the information theoretic notion of secrecy, which requires each eavesdropper to obtain essentially no information about the messages sent from knowledge of its received sequence, the channel statistics, and the codebooks used. We investigate two approaches to achieve secure communication. The first is to exploit the statistics of the channel from the sender to the legitimate receivers and the eavesdroppers. We introduce the wiretap channel as a 2-receiver broadcast channel with a legitimate receiver and an eavesdropper, and establish its secrecy capacity, which is the highest achievable secret communication rate. The idea is to design the encoder so that the channel from the sender to the receiver becomes effectively stronger than the channel to the eavesdropper; hence the receiver can recover the message but the eavesdropper cannot. This wiretap coding scheme involves multicoding and randomized encoding. If the channel from the sender to the receiver is weaker than that to the eavesdropper, however, secret communication at a positive rate is not possible. This brings us to the second approach to achieve secret communication, which is to use a secret key shared between the sender and the receiver but unknown to the eavesdropper. We show that the rate of such secret key must be at least as high as the rate of the confidential message. This raises the question of how the sender and the receiver can agree on such a long secret key in the first place. After all, if they had a confidential channel with sufficiently high capacity to communicate the key, then why not use it to communicate the message itself! We show that if the sender and the receiver have access to correlated sources (e.g., through a satellite beaming common randomness to them), then they can still agree on a secret key even when the channel has zero secrecy capacity. We first consider the source model for key agreement, where the sender communicates with the receiver over a noiseless public broadcast channel to generate a secret key from their correlated sources.

Cambridge University Press eBooks•Dec 8, 2011•1 citation
This paper reviews an approach to secret-key distribution based on the bounded observability (BO) model. First, the information-theoretic framework of secret-key agreement from a correlated random source is reviewed. Next, the BO model is introduced. In the context of this model, the BO condition is presented as a necessary and sufficient condition for the possibility of secret-key distribution. This condition describes limits on the information obtained by observation of a random object, and models the practical difficulty of completely observing random physical phenomena. Finally, an implementation of secret-key distribution based on BO in an optical fiber system is described.
Abstract Secret key distribution is a technique for a sender and a receiver to share a secret key, which is not known by any eavesdropper, when they share no common secret information in advance. By using this technique, the sender and the receiver can transmit a message securely in the sense that the message remains secret from any eavesdropper. We introduced a secret key distribution based on the Bounded Observability (Muramatsu et al. 2010, 2013, 2015), which provides a necessary and sufficient condition for the possibility of secret key distribution. This condition describes limits on the information obtained by observation of a random object, and models the practical difficulty of completely observing random physical phenomena.
A source model of key sharing between three users is considered in which each pair of them wishes to agree on a secret key hidden from the remaining user. There are rate-limited public channels for communications between the users. We give an inner bound on the secret key capacity region in this framework. Moreover, we investigate a practical setup in which localization information of the users as the correlated observations are exploited to share pairwise keys between the users. The inner and outer bounds of the key capacity region are analyzed in this setup for the case of i.i.d. Gaussian observations.
We study the problem of information-theoretically secure secret key agreement under the well-known source model and channel model. In both of these models, multiple terminals wish to create a shared secret key that is secure from a passive eavesdropper. The terminals have access to a noiseless public communication channel and an additional resource that depends on the model. In the source model, the resource is an external source that repeatedly beams correlated randomness to the terminals; whereas in the channel model, the resource is a secure but noisy discrete memoryless broadcast channel. We derive new lower and upper bounds on the secret key capacity under both the source model and the channel model. The technique used for deriving our bound for the source model is to find certain properties of functions of joint probability distributions which, applied to the joint distribution of the source, will imply that they dominate the secret key capacity, and then prove the bound by a verification argument. A similar technique is used for the channel model. Finally, we also define a problem of communication for omniscience by a neutral observer and establish the equivalence between this new problem and the problem of secret key agreement. This generalizes an earlier result of Csiszár and Narayan.
A secret key agreement setup between three users is considered in which each pair of them wishes to agree on a secret key hidden from the remaining user. The three users observe i.i.d. outputs of correlated sources and there is a noiseless public channel from each user for communication to the others. In this setup, inner and outer bounds of the secret key capacity region is derived. Moreover, some special cases are obtained in which the inner bound coincides the explicit outer bound. Also a binary-erasure example is presented through which the results are examined.
Confidentiality of information is a key consideration in many networking applications, including e-commerce, online banking, and intelligence operations. How can information be communicated reliably to the legitimate users, while keeping it secret from eavesdroppers? How does such a secrecy constraint on communication affect the limits on information flow in the network? In this chapter, we study these questions under the information theoretic notion of secrecy, which requires each eavesdropper to obtain essentially no information about the messages sent from knowledge of its received sequence, the channel statistics, and the codebooks used. We investigate two approaches to achieve secure communication. The first is to exploit the statistics of the channel from the sender to the legitimate receivers and the eavesdroppers. We introduce the wiretap channel as a 2-receiver broadcast channel with a legitimate receiver and an eavesdropper, and establish its secrecy capacity, which is the highest achievable secret communication rate. The idea is to design the encoder so that the channel from the sender to the receiver becomes effectively stronger than the channel to the eavesdropper; hence the receiver can recover the message but the eavesdropper cannot. This wiretap coding scheme involves multicoding and randomized encoding. If the channel from the sender to the receiver is weaker than that to the eavesdropper, however, secret communication at a positive rate is not possible. This brings us to the second approach to achieve secret communication, which is to use a secret key shared between the sender and the receiver but unknown to the eavesdropper. We show that the rate of such secret key must be at least as high as the rate of the confidential message. This raises the question of how the sender and the receiver can agree on such a long secret key in the first place. After all, if they had a confidential channel with sufficiently high capacity to communicate the key, then why not use it to communicate the message itself! We show that if the sender and the receiver have access to correlated sources (e.g., through a satellite beaming common randomness to them), then they can still agree on a secret key even when the channel has zero secrecy capacity. We first consider the source model for key agreement, where the sender communicates with the receiver over a noiseless public broadcast channel to generate a secret key from their correlated sources.