Optical fiber channels are used as media to transfer the information globally. This paper presents an implementation of a novel procedure using which a secured communication between two parties can be carried out using polarized beam of light over an optical fiber. The paper presents the experimental results obtained of the procedure in the lab environment and a security analysis of the same. It is observed that polarization state of a light pulse cannot be retained as it travels over an optical fiber because of the birefringence phenomenon. Multiple environmental factors such as pressure, vibration, temperature, etc. also add a non-linearity to the birefringence of an optical fiber leading towards an unpredictable polarization state changes over the course of an optical fiber. The proposed procedure helps the receiving party to successfully retrieve the data in the form of a polarization state transmitted by the sending party without having any knowledge about the state of polarization at the transmitting end. The paper also explains an added layer of security the procedure provides to the communicating parties to make it difficult for an adversary to fetch the data being transferred. The proposed system does not depend on the wavelength of the light being used, nor does it depend upon the type of the optical fiber used for the communication. Using this procedure, multiple bits of secured information can be sent over an optical fiber in a single polarized pulse and retrieved at the receiving end, also known as Polarization Shift Keying.
This paper proposes and analyzes the potential of a multi-photon tolerant quantum communication protocol to secure satellite communication. For securing satellite communication, quantum cryptography is the only known unconditionally secure method. A number of recent experiments have shown feasibility of satellite-aided global quantum key distribution (QKD) using different methods such as: Use of entangled photon pairs, decoy state methods, and entanglement swapping. The use of single photon in these methods restricts the distance and speed over which quantum cryptography can be applied.
Contemporary quantum cryptography protocols like the BB84 and its variants suffer from the limitation of reaching the distances of only Low Earth Orbit (LEO) at the data rates of few kilobits per second. This makes it impossible to develop a general satellite-based secure global communication network using the existing protocols. The method proposed in this paper allows secure communication at the heights of the Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) and Geosynchronous Earth Orbit (GEO) satellites. The benefits of the proposed method are two-fold: First it enables the realization of a secure global communication network based on satellites and second it provides unconditional security for satellite networks at GEO heights. The multi-photon approach discussed in this paper ameliorates the distance and speed issues associated with quantum cryptography through the use of contemporary laser communication (lasercom) devices. This approach can be seen as a step ahead towards global quantum communication.
This paper introduces an m-ary version of the Three-stage Quantum Cryptography protocol. The three-stage protocol was first proposed in 2006 and implemented in 2012. The m-ary version of the three-stage protocol proposed in this paper results in enhanced data transfer between a sender Alice and a receiver Bob since each pulse carries more than one bit of information. An experimental realization of the m-ary three-stage protocol is also reported in this paper. The implementation has used free-space optics as the transmission medium and passive optical components controlled through LabView. Furthermore, analytical results that address the impact of the noise factor and its trade-off with data rate are presented. This analysis includes a study of the probability of errors and channel capacity variations in terms of the noise variance factor for the m-ary three-stage protocol using two, four and eight levels. Limits within which the m-ary three-stage protocol can be used with higher performance efficiency compared to its original version counterpart are set.
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