Quantum Key Distribution (Research Paper)

Quantum Key Distribution

This paper will focus mainly on public key infrastructure, the concept of the one-time pad that resolves PKI woes, and a quantum key distribution solution to the shortcomings of the one time pad.

Security is a prevalent part of modern existence in the “real” world. It goes without saying that anything of any worth to another person or entity needs to be monitored and protected to ensure its safety and well-being. As the world today is advancing to a future in which the digital is sewn into the very fabric of our “analog, flesh-and-bones” society, we are faced with challenges surrounding protecting our digital data that in terms translates to our digital persona’s behavior. There are trends towards the ‘Internet of things’ (where vehicles, buildings, and appliances communicate intelligently with each other and other devices), wearable/ ingestible/ skin-embeddable technology, neural networks, and big data processing to reap the benefits of harvesting all this data. As our data and digital personas increase in size and complexity, this data is valuable to many entities: debt collectors, marketers, data miners/ brokers, the government and other prying eyes. How does the individual, business or nation-state protect their most valuable secrets as well as a simple shopping list?

Digital security should address these concerns and always err on the side of caution. This project will look into a feasible way of securing data on the move, i.e. data in transit. Current standards fall short in respect to sending data in the clear after the initial authentication. When data is at rest, it is arguably easier to secure as there are no “moving pieces” to contend with, as long as good encryption and access exclusivity are practiced. In opposition to simply encrypting the handshaking process, we need to understand that an eavesdropper, Eve, will persist both before and after Alice and Bob, or Points A and B, meet and authenticate each other. There is also an issue of a suitable compromise between data transit speed, convenience, and security.

Simon Singh’s The Code Book is a timeline of cryptography, starting from the Arabs, the Egyptians and Julius Caesar, to modern techniques such as Diffie-Hellman exchanges, and to the future, quantum cryptography. The Security Now podcast has been aired live on Wednesdays, and as a downloadable podcast, since 2006. It entails Leo Laporte of the TwiT Network interviewing Steve Gibson of the Gibson Research Group, who coined the term “spyware”, about weekly digital security events. The article that delves into PKI and long-term sustainability was the launching point of this paper, and will be used to build a backbone off of. The author used it in the initial draft of this proposal paper.

The author currently works in the Information Protection department of a Fortune 500 Company, and is an avid reader of security-related books, news, publications, and trends. This prior knowledge as well as a keen interest in this field should bolster the efforts of researching this extremely important aspect of contemporary digital existence. Primary research and knowledge gathering shall be done using published material on cryptography, as well as peer-reviewed papers in this field from online databases. The author also plans on reaching out to authors of papers that are behind “pay-walls”, an ubiquitous hindrance in scholarly paper access.

This project will be partitioned into 3 phases: two weeks to gather baseline data on PKI, one-time pads and quantum key distribution (QKD), in which pros, cons and current limitations would be researched and documented; two weeks to delve into quantum keys and quantum computing challenges, breakthroughs and future features; and the last two weeks to tie it all together into a timeline from the one time pad of old, to quantum key distribution models of tomorrow, and a conclusion about the potential and reality of QKD. Milestone touch-points with the instructor will be scheduled to chart progress and correct missteps in a timely fashion.

(Preliminary Bibliography)

  1. Singh, Simon. The Code Book: The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography. New York: Anchor, 2000. Print
  2. ,Laporte, Leo & Gibson, Steve. (Producers). (2006 – 2013). Security Now [Audio podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.grc.com/securitynow.htm.
  3.  Long-Term Confidentiality of PKI(http://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2012/1/144813-long-term-confidentiality-of-pki/fulltext). Chi-Sung Laih, Shang-Ming Jen, Chia-Yu Lu. Communicationsof the ACM, Vol. 55 No. 1, Pages 91-95.

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