The Case for Quantum Key Distribution

Douglas Stebila; Michele Mosca; Norbert Lütkenhaus

1st International ICST Workshop on Quantum and Classical Information Security

Research Article

The Case for Quantum Key Distribution

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@INPROCEEDINGS{10.1007/978-3-642-11731-2_35,
    author={Douglas Stebila and Michele Mosca and Norbert L\'{y}tkenhaus},
    title={The Case for Quantum Key Distribution},
    proceedings={1st International ICST Workshop on Quantum and Classical Information Security},
    proceedings_a={QCIS},
    year={2012},
    month={10},
    keywords={Quantum key distribution quantum cryptography},
    doi={10.1007/978-3-642-11731-2_35}
}

Douglas Stebila
Michele Mosca
Norbert Lütkenhaus
Year: 2012
The Case for Quantum Key Distribution
QCIS
Springer
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-642-11731-2_35

Douglas Stebila¹^,*, Michele Mosca^,*, Norbert Lütkenhaus²^,*

1: Queensland University of Technology
2: University of Waterloo

*Contact email: douglas@stebila.ca, mmosca@iqc.ca, nlutkenhaus@iqc.ca

Abstract

Quantum key distribution (QKD) promises secure key agreement by using quantum mechanical systems. We argue that QKD will be an important part of future cryptographic infrastructures. It can provide long-term confidentiality for encrypted information without reliance on computational assumptions. Although QKD still requires authentication to prevent man-in-the-middle attacks, it can make use of either information-theoretically secure symmetric key authentication or computationally secure public key authentication: even when using public key authentication, we argue that QKD still offers stronger security than classical key agreement.

Keywords: Quantum key distribution quantum cryptography

Published: 2012-10-11

: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-11731-2_35