This press release is copyrighted by The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE). Its use is granted only to journalists and news media. Embargo date: 26 April 2002, 5:00 p.m. ET.
Could the battle between code-makers and code-breakers be ending? Physicists are putting the finishing touches to a new way of encrypting messages that is more secure than any past cipher, writes contributing editor Justin Mullins in "Making Unbreakable Code" in the May 2002 issue of IEEE Spectrum.
The technique, known as quantum cryptography, combines a decades-old method of encryption, mathematically proven unbreakable, with a novel theft-proof method of distributing the encryption key, whose security is grounded in the laws of quantum mechanics.
The novelty is the technique's use of a quantum property of photons, their polarization. Should an eavesdropper listen in on the transmission of a key, the strange laws of quantum mechanics mean that the photons are inevitably--and detectably--disturbed. When eavesdropping is detected, a new key can be sent. Only when the sender and receiver are sure their key is secure do they use it to encrypt and transmit information over conventional channels such as e-mail.
Experimental encrypted messages are already being sent and received securely over tens of kilometers of optical fibers and through the air. The first portable quantum cryptography machine, unveiled last summer at the Los Alamos National Laboratories, can send encrypted messages through the air over dozens of kilometers and works day or night in good weather and in bad according to develooper Richard Hughes. And in Geneva, Switzerland, a small start-up called ID Quantique has begun marketing a commercial quantum cryptography device that works with an optical-fiber connection.
Researchers predict that it will not be long before ultra-secret messages are routinely transmitted this way. But because the technology used to implement quantum cryptography isn't perfect, some limitations remain, according to Mullins. So physicists and engineers still have some work to do before the technique becomes widespread.
Contact: Samuel K. Moore, 212 419 7921, [email protected].For a faxed copy of the complete article ("Making Unbreakable Code" by Justin Mullins, Contributing Editor, IEEE Spectrum, May 2002, pp. 40-45) or to arrange an interview, contact: Nancy T. Hantman, 212 419 7561, [email protected].
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