Secure End-To-End Data Transport in Quantum Networks

A secure end-to-end data transport protocol in quantum network is presented. A quantum network means we transport data by encoding a data into a certain quantum state on a qubit, and transmitting the qubit from sender to receiver. Because of the network scalability and physical technology limit in long distance teleportation, a fully connected quantum network model is impossible. Hence, in our quantum network model, the qubit is transported node by node to the receiver. However, this model arises two new security issues. The first is that intermediate nodes, which forward the qubit in the route, can snoop on information during the data transport. The second is that intermediate nodes can maliciously and illegally modify the transported qubit and forward it to the successor. In this paper, we present a protocol that can (1) prevent from snooping and (2) imperceptibly determine the node that maliciously modifies the transported data. By the presented protocol, we can transport information securely through the entire route in the quantum network.