dorsal/arxiv
View SchemaGeneralized decoding, effective channels, and simplified security proofs in quantum key distribution
| Authors | Joseph M. Renes, Markus Grassl |
|---|---|
| Categories | |
| ArXiv ID | quant-ph/0505061 |
| URL | https://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0505061 |
| DOI | 10.1103/PhysRevA.74.022317 |
| Journal | Phys. Rev. A 74, 022317 (2006) |
Abstract
Prepare and measure quantum key distribution protocols can be decomposed into two basic steps: delivery of the signals over a quantum channel and distillation of a secret key from the signal and measurement records by classical processing and public communication. Here we formalize the distillation process for a general protocol in a purely quantum-mechanical framework and demonstrate that it can be viewed as creating an ``effective'' quantum channel between the legitimate users Alice and Bob. The process of secret key generation can then be viewed as entanglement distribution using this channel, which enables application of entanglement-based security proofs to essentially any prepare and measure protocol. To ensure secrecy of the key, Alice and Bob must be able to estimate the channel noise from errors in the key, and we further show how symmetries of the distillation process simplify this task. Applying this method, we prove the security of several key distribution protocols based on equiangular spherical codes.
{
"annotation_id": "3878c28b-a6d5-423c-9043-d801c2b21dda",
"date_created": "2026-03-02T18:02:16.025000Z",
"date_modified": "2026-03-02T18:02:16.025000Z",
"file_hash": "5af1084cd6efb6f8d96f6c4f6732dfd36851602c14361cb99479e683a2212303",
"private": false,
"record": {
"abstract": "Prepare and measure quantum key distribution protocols can be decomposed into\ntwo basic steps: delivery of the signals over a quantum channel and\ndistillation of a secret key from the signal and measurement records by\nclassical processing and public communication. Here we formalize the\ndistillation process for a general protocol in a purely quantum-mechanical\nframework and demonstrate that it can be viewed as creating an ``effective\u0027\u0027\nquantum channel between the legitimate users Alice and Bob. The process of\nsecret key generation can then be viewed as entanglement distribution using\nthis channel, which enables application of entanglement-based security proofs\nto essentially any prepare and measure protocol. To ensure secrecy of the key,\nAlice and Bob must be able to estimate the channel noise from errors in the\nkey, and we further show how symmetries of the distillation process simplify\nthis task. Applying this method, we prove the security of several key\ndistribution protocols based on equiangular spherical codes.",
"arxiv_id": "quant-ph/0505061",
"authors": [
"Joseph M. Renes",
"Markus Grassl"
],
"categories": [
"quant-ph"
],
"doi": "10.1103/PhysRevA.74.022317",
"journal_ref": "Phys. Rev. A 74, 022317 (2006)",
"title": "Generalized decoding, effective channels, and simplified security proofs in quantum key distribution",
"url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0505061"
},
"schema_id": "dorsal/arxiv",
"source": {
"execution_id": "785ce14b-f7bb-4577-880a-a474e9f71c96",
"id": "arXiv Dataset IDs",
"type": "Model",
"variant": "snapshot-2026-03-01",
"version": "0.1.0"
},
"user_id": 1000002
}