This protocol, known as BB84 after its inventors and year of publication, was originally described using photon polarization states to transmit the information.C. H. Bennett and G. Brassard. Quantum cryptography: Public key distribution and coin tossing. In Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Computers, Systems and Signal Processing, volume 175, page 8. New York, 1984. However, any two pairs of conjugate states can be used for the protocol, and many optical-fibre-based implementations described as BB84 use phase encoded states. The sender (traditionally referred to as Alice) and the receiver (Bob) are connected by a quantum communication channel which allows quantum states to be transmitted. In the case of photons this channel is generally either an optical fibre or simply free space. In addition they communicate via a public classical channel, for example using broadcast radio or the internet. The protocol is designed with the assumption that an eavesdropper (referred to as Eve) can interfere in any way with the quantum channel, while the classical channel needs to be authenticated.
This protocol, known as BB84 after its inventors and year of publication, was originally described using photon polarization states to transmit the information.C. H. Bennett and G. Brassard. Quantum cryptography: Public key distribution and coin tossing. In Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Computers, Systems and Signal Processing, volume 175, page 8. New York, 1984 However, any two pairs of conjugate states can be used for the protocol, and many optical-fibre-based implementations described as BB84 use phase encoded states. The sender (traditionally referred to as Alice) and the receiver (Bob) are connected by a quantum communication channel which allows quantum states to be transmitted. In the case of photons this channel is generally either an optical fibre or simply free space. In addition they communicate via a public classical channel, for example using. broadcast radio or the internet. The protocol is designed with the assumption that an eavesdropper (referred to as Eve) can interfere in any way with the quantum channel, while the classical channel needs to be authenticated.