Ab Fab Progress with Quantum Leaps
I trust all here on El Reg understood all of that and take Solace from IT.
UK-based boffins have set a new record for quantum key distribution in a move that paves the way towards faster high security communication networks for banks and governments. Toshiba Research Europe Cambridge hit a sustained secure bit rate exceeding 1 Mbps over 50 km of fibre for the first time, around 100-1000 times faster …
Next come the moans that criminals will use the same tech to send pictures of kids to each other etc. and we'll get the 'If you are using encryption then you've got someting to hide from the authorities' bollocks again.
That or using quantum will open up a rift in the space-time continum and we will become partially attatched to a parallel universe (no, the Red Dwarf eposide came in to my head afterwards) in which case - I for one . . .
"The Titanic was unsinkable, too."
It was never proven to be so, was it? Turns out that marketing has almost nothing to do with physics or mathematics. Who knew?
Compare QKD with traditional public key systems whose security limits have been well established. New techniques for calculating prime factors or solving the discrete logarithm problem will render PK systems noticably less secure, and quantum computing could conceivably blow them out of the water entirely. Not so with quantum cryptography.
Don't mistake being trite with being profound.
What happened to the research on twined particles?
Two particles (electrons?) were paired, causing their spins to match, and any change to one caused a like change in the other, no matter the distance... flip, flop, 1, 0, ...
Not only would this not subject to interception, but was instantaneous. This did not violate faster-than-light because they were paired outside of our distance-laden dimension, or something.
Anyone?
Consider that it takes millions of attempts to entangle just a single pair of atoms (albeit done in a fairly automated way), it isn't economically feasible just yet. That and the fact that simply by observing the data held by a qubit alters that information, it is, as of yet, unreliable too.
Only from a photon point of view, i.e. start of fibre to end of fibre. Any electronic switch/router/repeater needed for normal use has to be physically secured as it could be used to tamper/intercept data without detection.
So great for big organisations who need a secure point-to-point link between secured sites, but going nowhere for the majority of internet traffic.