Managing the Proliferation of Quantum Technologies

Amal Kasry

Vincent Lew Kok Seng, Au Thien Wan, S. H. Shah Newaz +1 more

Blockchain has been paving the way for new business opportunities as we have witnessed over the last few years. It will continue to proliferate further and be adopted in increasingly diverse sectors. One area of research in Blockchain is how it can be used in Internet of Things (IoT) based applications like Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV), Smart cities and Healthcare. However, with the advent of quantum technology, some widely used security algorithms in blockchain are vulnerable (i.e., quantum algorithms can exponentially solve cryptographic algorithms used to digitally sign or encrypt data), thereby diminishing communication security. Thus, post-quantum algorithms are at the forefront of research to secure data before quantum technologies can fully mature. Early standardized post-quantum algorithms such as hash-based one-time signatures, relies on the proven one-way-ness of hashing algorithm. Hash-based one-time signatures require robust secret key management systems to prevent security degradation. To safeguard IoT applications from quantum threats, this paper proposes a solution which utilizes both hash-based one-time signatures and blockchain to cover each technology's weaknesses.

Sunil Prajapat

The convergence of 6G communication technologies and the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) has revolutionized modern healthcare by enabling real-time monitoring, intelligent diagnosis, and remote patient management. However, the proliferation of interconnected medical devices also exposes the ecosystem to severe security challenges, including identity forgery, data tampering, and emerging quantum-based attacks. To address these challenges, this paper proposes a blockchain-assisted quantum signature framework for securing data exchange in 6G - enabled IoMT environments. The proposed framework leverages quantum digital signatures (QDS) based on entangled photon states to ensure message authenticity and non-repudiation, while blockchain technology provides decentralized trust management and immutable transaction logging. A Medical Authorization Center (MAC) coordinates identity registration, signature verification, and consensus-based access control among IoMT entities. Furthermore, smart contracts are utilized to automate trust evaluation and audit trails, thereby mitigating insider and replay attacks. Performance analysis using Qiskit simulations and IBM’s quantum backends demonstrates an average signature fidelity of 91% and a communication efficiency of 75.61%, validating the framework’s robustness for resource-constrained medical devices. By fusing quantum communication primitives with blockchain-enabled transparency, this work presents a scalable and tamper-resistant security solution for next-generation healthcare networks. The convergence of 6G communication technologies and the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) has revolutionized modern healthcare by enabling real-time monitoring, intelligent diagnosis, and remote patient management. However, the proliferation of interconnected medical devices also exposes the ecosystem to severe security challenges, including identity forgery, data tampering, and emerging quantum-based attacks. To address these challenges, this paper proposes a blockchain-assisted quantum signature framework for securing data exchange in 6G-enabled IoMT environments. The proposed framework leverages quantum digital signatures (QDS) based on entangled photon states to ensure message authenticity and non-repudiation, while blockchain technology provides decentralized trust management and immutable transaction logging. A Medical Authorization Center (MAC) coordinates identity registration, signature verification, and consensus-based access control among IoMT entities. Furthermore, smart contracts are utilized to automate trust evaluation and audit trails, thereby mitigating insider and replay attacks. Performance analysis using Qiskit simulations and IBM’s quantum backends demonstrates an average signature fidelity of 91% and a communication efficiency of 75.61%, validating the framework’s robustness for resource-constrained medical devices. By fusing quantum communication primitives with blockchain-enabled transparency, this work presents a scalable and tamper-resistant security solution for next-generation healthcare networks.

Abraham Bernstein, Juan Carrasquilla, Markus Christen +13 more

Olivia Jana, Shivnath Ghosh

The healthcare industry is experiencing a significant digital transformation due to the proliferation of electronic health records, medical imaging technologies, wearable sensors, genomic sequencing, and Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) devices. These technologies produce enormous quantities of heterogeneous and high-dimensional data that hold valuable insights for disease diagnosis, prognosis, treatment planning and population health management. Conventional machine learning and deep learning methods have achieved significant success in extracting patterns from medical data, but their performance is increasingly limited by computational complexity, scalability limitations, and the increasing dimensionality of healthcare datasets. Quantum Machine Learning (QML) is a young interdisciplinary field, which integrates quantum computing with machine learning methods, and offers a promising way to overcome these challenges and enable more powerful intelligent healthcare systems.

Blanchard, Philippe, Erwin Brüning