China set to launch an 'unhackable' internet communication

[Batu69]

As malicious hackers mount ever more sophisticated attacks, China is about to launch a new, "unhackable" communications network - at least in the sense that any attack on it would be quickly detected.

 

The technology it has turned to is quantum cryptography, a radical break from the traditional encryption methods around. The Chinese project in the city of Jinan has been touted as a milestone by state media.

 

The pioneering project is also part of a bigger story: China is taking the lead in a technology in which the West has long been hesitant to invest.

In the Jinan network, some 200 users from the military, government, finance and electricity sectors will be able to send messages safe in the knowledge that only they are reading them.

 

China's push in quantum communication means the country is taking huge strides developing applications that might make the increasingly vulnerable internet more secure. Applications that other countries soon might find themselves buying from China.

 

So, what is this technology into which the country is pouring massive resources?

'Unhackable' communication

If you send a message you want to keep secure from eavesdroppers, traditional encryption works by hiding the key needed to read the message in a very difficult mathematical problem.

But what is "difficult" in terms of maths? It means you have to think really fast to figure it out as you try endless combinations of long, numeric keys. In 2017, that means you need to use a very powerful computer.

 

Steady improvements in computer power mean that the number-based keys have to be lengthened periodically. Encryption has a shelf life and is rapidly becoming more vulnerable.

 

There are also fears that the development of quantum computers, which effectively represent a massive step change in number crunching ability, will render much of modern encryption software vulnerable.

 

Quantum communication works differently:

• If you want to send your secure message, you first separately send a key embedded in particles of light
• Only then doyou send your encrypted message and the receiver will be able to read it with the help of the key sent beforehand

 

The crucial advantage of this so-called quantum key distribution is that if anyone tries to intercept the light particles, they necessarily alter or destroy them.

What this means is that any attempt at hacking will immediately be noticed by the original sender and the intended receiver - hence its description as "unhackable".

Leaving the West behind

If quantum communication can help to secure online communications, why is China so far ahead?

"For a long time people simply didn't think it was needed," says Prof Myungshik Kim of Imperial College, London, adding that it was not clear whether there was a commercial market for this technology.

 

"The mathematical difficulty of the current coding system was so high that it was not thought necessary to implement the new technology," he says.

The research itself is not new and China does not have an edge over the competition. Where it does have an advantage is when it comes to applications.

 

"Europe has simply missed the boat," says Prof Anton Zeilinger, a quantum physicist at Vienna University in Austria and a pioneer in the field.

He says he tried to convince the EU as early as 2004 to fund more quantum-based projects but it had little effect.

 

"Europe has been dragging its feet and this has hindered us from being able to compete," he says.

There are quantum key-based networks operating in the US and Europe but most are being carried out as research projects, rather than with commercial partners.

Creating a market

One problem is that it is expensive to build applications like the Jinan network. And if there is not yet a commercial market, it is hard to get investors or governments as backers.

 

"We have to admit that when China invests into something, they have the financial power and manpower that is beyond probably anything else in the world except the US military," says Valerio Scarani, a physicist with Centre for Quantum Technologies at the National University of Singapore. The Jinan network is not the only quantum communication application China has developed.

 

Last year, it launched a satellite equipped to test quantum communication over large distances that cannot be bridged by cables. There has also been a link established between the country's two main hubs, Beijing and Shanghai, so both ends can communicate and know when others are listening in.

 

So while it might not be clear yet whether quantum communication will indeed be the one technology to replace traditional encryption, it is widely considered as one of the leading candidates.

 

And China, in turn, is the leading country when it comes to building and experimenting with real applications of it.

"It's a situation where the technology can create its market," says Prof Zeilinger.

 

Once the technology is sold by Chinese companies, international banks might well be the first lining up as customers.

 

Article source

[tao]

As malicious hackers find ever more sophisticated ways to launch attacks, China is about to launch the Jinan Project, the world's first unhackable computer network, and a major milestone in the development of quantum technology.

 

 

Named after the eastern Chinese city where the technology was developed, the network is planned to be fully operational by the end of August 2017. Jinan is the hub of the Beijing-Shanghai quantum network due to its strategic location between the two principal Chinese metropolises.

 

"We plan to use the network for national defence, finance and other fields, and hope to spread it out as a pilot that if successful can be used across China and the whole world," commented Zhou Fei, assistant director of the Jinan Institute of Quantum Technology, who was speaking to Britain's Financial Times.

 

By launching the network, China will become the first country worldwide to implement quantum technology for a real life, commercial end. It also highlights that China is a key global player in the rush to develop technologies based on quantum principles, with the EU and the United States also vying for world leadership in the field.

 

The network, known as a quantum key distribution (QKD) network, is more secure than widely used electronic communication equivalents. Unlike a conventional telephone or internet cable, which can be tapped without the sender or recipient being aware, a QKD network alerts both users to any tampering with the system as soon as it occurs. This is because tampering immediately alters the information being relayed, with the disturbance being instantly recognisable. Once fully implemented, it will make it almost impossible for other governments to listen in on Chinese communications.

 

In the Jinan network, some 200 users from China's military, government, finance and electricity sectors will be able to send messages safe in the knowledge that only they are reading them. It will be the world's longest land-based quantum communications network, stretching over 2 000 km.

 

Also speaking to the Financial Times, quantum physicist Tim Byrnes, based at New York University's (NYU) Shanghai campus commented: "China has achieved staggering things with quantum research… It's amazing how quickly China has gotten on with quantum research projects that would be too expensive to do elsewhere… quantum communication has been taken up by the commercial sector much more in China compared to other countries, which means it is likely to pull ahead of Europe and US in the field of quantum communication."

 

However, Europe is also determined to also be at the forefront of the 'quantum revolution' which promises to be one of the major defining technological phenomena of the twenty-first century. The EU has invested EUR 550 million into quantum technologies and has provided policy support to researchers through the 2016 Quantum Manifesto.

 

Moreover, with China's latest achievement (and a previous one already notched up from July 2017 when its quantum satellite—the world's first—sent a message to Earth on a quantum communication channel), it looks like the race to be crowned the world's foremost quantum power is well and truly underway.

 

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[Batu69]

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7 hours ago, adi said:

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