SECURE INTERACTIONS WITH QUANTUM DEVICES
Abstract
The past few years have born witness to a major phase transition in the development of quantum computing devices. Devices operating reliably on tens of quantum bits (qubits) have now been demonstrated on a wide variety of experimental platforms. By now it seems unavoidable that the next 5 years will see unequivocal demonstrations of quantum computational advantages. The first such demonstrations, for random sampling problems, have already been claimed; marked progress in quantum simulation, quantum chemistry and quantum machine learning suggest that useful and uncontroversial demonstration of quantum advantage lies just around the corner. These speedy developments raise major challenges for the security and trustworthiness of our emerging quantum computing infrastructure. Due to the very principles on which they operate, such as quantum entanglement and no-cloning, quantum devices are exponentially complex to simulate and generally cannot be probed without irreversible disturbance. How can such devices be characterized, tested, and securely used? Beyond these challenges lie major opportunities for cybersecurity. What new cryptographic properties are enabled by quantum information? The main objective of this project is to design interactive protocols that enable securely testing and certifying medium-to-large scale quantum devices and making use of them for novel cryptographic tasks. In order to achieve this we build on the theory of interactive proofs from (quantum) complexity theory and combine it with lines of work in self-testing, in device-independent cryptography, and in post-quantum cryptography. Our protocols leverage fundamental quantum phenomena, such as entanglement and the no-cloning principle, as a basis for establishing security. We expect our protocols to be essential components of a future quantum network. Towards making this prospect a reality we devote a component of our research to making contact with future experimental realizations.
Document Details
- Document Type
- DoD Grant Award
- Publication Date
- Apr 20, 2023
- Source ID
- FA95502210391
Entities
People
- Thomas Vidick
Organizations
- Air Force Office of Scientific Research
- United States Air Force
- Weizmann Institute of Science