Via www.redorbit.com
The world’s first “unbreakable” quantum encryption network was unveiled this week at a science conference in Vienna.
The EU-sponsored network (called SECOQC) uses 200 km of fiber optic cables, provided by Siemens, to interconnect six locations in Vienna and the neighboring town of St. Poelten.
Quantum cryptography is markedly different from current security schemes, which are based on complex mathematical procedures that are extremely difficult, but not impossible, for outsiders to crack.
Instead, quantum systems harness the inherently unbreakable laws of quantum theory. The notion of quantum cryptography was established 25 years ago by Charles Bennett of IBM and Gilles Brassard of Montreal University, who was in attendance this week in Vienna to observe the new network in action.
“All quantum security schemes are based on the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, on the fact that you cannot measure quantum information without disturbing it,” Brassard told BBC News.
“Because of that, one can have a communications channel between two users on which it’s impossible to eavesdrop without creating a disturbance. An eavesdropper would create a mark on it. That was the key idea.”
