31,193 research outputs found
Asymmetric Multi-Party Computation
Current protocols for Multi-Party Computation (MPC) consider the setting where all parties have access to similar resources. For example, all parties have access to channels bounded by the same worst-case delay upper bound ?, and all channels have the same cost of communication. As a consequence, the overall protocol performance (resp. the communication cost) may be heavily affected by the slowest (resp. the most expensive) channel, even when most channels are fast (resp. cheap). Given the state of affairs, we initiate a systematic study of asymmetric MPC. In asymmetric MPC, the parties are divided into two categories: fast and slow parties, depending on whether they have access to high-end or low-end resources.
We investigate two different models. In the first, we consider asymmetric communication delays: Fast parties are connected via channels with small delay ? among themselves, while channels connected to (at least) one slow party have a large delay ? ? ?. In the second model, we consider asymmetric communication costs: Fast parties benefit from channels with cheap communication, while channels connected to a slow party have an expensive communication. We provide a wide range of positive and negative results exploring the trade-offs between the achievable number of tolerated corruptions t and slow parties s, versus the round complexity and communication cost in each of the models. Among others, we achieve the following results. In the model with asymmetric communication delays, focusing on the information-theoretic (i-t) setting:
- An i-t asymmetric MPC protocol with security with abort as long as t+s < n and t < n/2, in a constant number of slow rounds.
- We show that achieving an i-t asymmetric MPC protocol for t+s = n and with number of slow rounds independent of the circuit size implies an i-t synchronous MPC protocol with round complexity independent of the circuit size, which is a major problem in the field of round-complexity of MPC.
- We identify a new primitive, asymmetric broadcast, that allows to consistently distribute a value among the fast parties, and at a later time the same value to slow parties. We completely characterize the feasibility of asymmetric broadcast by showing that it is possible if and only if 2t + s < n.
- An i-t asymmetric MPC protocol with guaranteed output delivery as long as t+s < n and t < n/2, in a number of slow rounds independent of the circuit size.
In the model with asymmetric communication cost, we achieve an asymmetric MPC protocol for security with abort for t+s < n and t < n/2, based on one-way functions (OWF). The protocol communicates a number of bits over expensive channels that is independent of the circuit size. We conjecture that assuming OWF is needed and further provide a partial result in this direction
Quantum process tomography of a high-dimensional quantum communication channel
The characterization of quantum processes, e.g. communication channels, is an
essential ingredient for establishing quantum information systems. For quantum
key distribution protocols, the amount of overall noise in the channel
determines the rate at which secret bits are distributed between authorized
partners. In particular, tomographic protocols allow for the full
reconstruction, and thus characterization, of the channel. Here, we perform
quantum process tomography of high-dimensional quantum communication channels
with dimensions ranging from 2 to 5. We can thus explicitly demonstrate the
effect of an eavesdropper performing an optimal cloning attack or an
intercept-resend attack during a quantum cryptographic protocol. Moreover, our
study shows that quantum process tomography enables a more detailed
understanding of the channel conditions compared to a coarse-grained measure,
such as quantum bit error rates. This full characterization technique allows us
to optimize the performance of quantum key distribution under asymmetric
experimental conditions, which is particularly useful when considering
high-dimensional encoding schemes.Comment: 13 pages, 6 figure
Multiphoton communication in lossy channels with photon-number entangled states
We address binary and quaternary communication channels based on correlated
multiphoton two-mode states of radiation in the presence of losses. The
protocol are based on photon number correlations and realized upon choosing a
shared set of thresholds to convert the outcome of a joint photon number
measurement into a symbol from a discrete alphabet. In particular, we focus on
channels build using feasible photon-number entangled states (PNES) as two-mode
coherently-correlated (TMC) or twin-beam (TWB) states and compare their
performances with that of channels built using feasible classically correlated
(separable) states. We found that PNES provide larger channel capacity in the
presence of loss, and that TWB-based channels may transmit a larger amount of
information than TMC-based ones at fixed energy and overall loss. Optimized bit
discrimination thresholds, as well as the corresponding maximized mutual
information, are explicitly evaluated as a function of the beam intensity and
the loss parameter. The propagation of TMC and TWB in lossy channels is
analyzed and the joint photon number distribution is evaluated, showing that
the beam statistics, either sub-Poissonian for TMC or super-Poissonian for TWB,
is not altered by losses. Although entanglement is not strictly needed to
establish the channels, which are based on photon-number correlations owned
also by separable mixed states, purity of the support state is relevant to
increase security. The joint requirement of correlation and purity individuates
PNES as a suitable choice to build effective channels. The effects of losses on
channel security are briefly discussed.Comment: 8 pages, 19 figure
Tree Codes Improve Convergence Rate of Consensus Over Erasure Channels
We study the problem of achieving average consensus between a group of agents
over a network with erasure links. In the context of consensus problems, the
unreliability of communication links between nodes has been traditionally
modeled by allowing the underlying graph to vary with time. In other words,
depending on the realization of the link erasures, the underlying graph at each
time instant is assumed to be a subgraph of the original graph. Implicit in
this model is the assumption that the erasures are symmetric: if at time t the
packet from node i to node j is dropped, the same is true for the packet
transmitted from node j to node i. However, in practical wireless communication
systems this assumption is unreasonable and, due to the lack of symmetry,
standard averaging protocols cannot guarantee that the network will reach
consensus to the true average. In this paper we explore the use of channel
coding to improve the performance of consensus algorithms. For symmetric
erasures, we show that, for certain ranges of the system parameters, repetition
codes can speed up the convergence rate. For asymmetric erasures we show that
tree codes (which have recently been designed for erasure channels) can be used
to simulate the performance of the original "unerased" graph. Thus, unlike
conventional consensus methods, we can guarantee convergence to the average in
the asymmetric case. The price is a slowdown in the convergence rate, relative
to the unerased network, which is still often faster than the convergence rate
of conventional consensus algorithms over noisy links
Experimental link quality characterization of wireless sensor networks for underground monitoring
Wireless underground sensor networks (WUSNs)
are a category of wireless sensor networks (WSNs) with buried
nodes, which communicate wirelessly through soil with sensor
nodes located aboveground. As the communication medium (i.e.,
soil) between traditional over-the-air WSNs and WUSNs differs,
communication characteristics have to be fully characterized
for WUSNs, specifically to enable development of efficient
communication protocols. Characterization of link quality is a
fundamental building block for various communication protocols.
The aim of this paper is to experimentally investigate the
link quality characteristics of the three communication channels
available in WUSNs for underground pipeline monitoring
to gain further insight into protocol development for WUSNs.
To this end, received signal strength (RSS), link quality indicator
(LQI), and packet reception ratio (PRR) are characterized
for the three communication channels in WUSNs. The RSS and
PRR results show that the underground-to-underground channel
is highly symmetric and temporally stable, but its range is severely
limited, and that the aboveground-to-underground/undergroundto-
underground channels are asymmetric and exhibit similar
temporal properties to over-the-air communication channels.
Interestingly, the results show that RSS is a better indicator of
PRR than LQI for all three channels under consideration.http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/RecentIssue.jsp?punumber=9424hb2016Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineerin
Asymmetric Protocols for Scalable High-Rate Measurement-Device-Independent Quantum Key Distribution Networks
Measurement-device-independent quantum key distribution (MDI-QKD) can
eliminate detector side channels and prevent all attacks on detectors. The
future of MDI-QKD is a quantum network that provides service to many users over
untrusted relay nodes. In a real quantum network, the losses of various
channels are different and users are added and deleted over time. To adapt to
these features, we propose a type of protocols that allow users to
independently choose their optimal intensity settings to compensate for
different channel losses. Such protocol enables a scalable high-rate MDI-QKD
network that can easily be applied for channels of different losses and allows
users to be dynamically added/deleted at any time without affecting the
performance of existing users.Comment: Changed the title to better represent the generality of our method,
and added more discussions on its application to alternative protocols (in
Sec. II, the new Table II, and Appendix E with new Fig. 9). Added more
conceptual explanations in Sec. II on the difference between X and Z bases in
MDI-QKD. Added additional discussions on security of the scheme in Sec. II
and Appendix
Using quantum key distribution for cryptographic purposes: a survey
The appealing feature of quantum key distribution (QKD), from a cryptographic
viewpoint, is the ability to prove the information-theoretic security (ITS) of
the established keys. As a key establishment primitive, QKD however does not
provide a standalone security service in its own: the secret keys established
by QKD are in general then used by a subsequent cryptographic applications for
which the requirements, the context of use and the security properties can
vary. It is therefore important, in the perspective of integrating QKD in
security infrastructures, to analyze how QKD can be combined with other
cryptographic primitives. The purpose of this survey article, which is mostly
centered on European research results, is to contribute to such an analysis. We
first review and compare the properties of the existing key establishment
techniques, QKD being one of them. We then study more specifically two generic
scenarios related to the practical use of QKD in cryptographic infrastructures:
1) using QKD as a key renewal technique for a symmetric cipher over a
point-to-point link; 2) using QKD in a network containing many users with the
objective of offering any-to-any key establishment service. We discuss the
constraints as well as the potential interest of using QKD in these contexts.
We finally give an overview of challenges relative to the development of QKD
technology that also constitute potential avenues for cryptographic research.Comment: Revised version of the SECOQC White Paper. Published in the special
issue on QKD of TCS, Theoretical Computer Science (2014), pp. 62-8
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