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arXiv · 1306.4413

Experimental unconditionally secure bit commitment

Yang Liu·Yuan Cao·Marcos Curty·Sheng-Kai Liao·Jian Wang·Ke Cui·Yu-Huai Li·Ze-Hong Lin·Qi-Chao Sun·Dong-Dong Li·Hong-Fei Zhang·Yong Zhao·Cheng-Zhi Peng·Qiang Zhang·Adan Cabello·Jian-Wei Pan
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Abstract

Bit commitment is a fundamental cryptographic task that guarantees a secure commitment between two mutually mistrustful parties and is a building block for many cryptographic primitives, including coin tossing, zero-knowledge proofs, oblivious transfer and secure two-party computation. Unconditionally secure bit commitment was thought to be impossible until recent theoretical protocols that combine quantum mechanics and relativity were shown to elude previous impossibility proofs. Here we implement such a bit commitment protocol. In the experiment, the committer performs quantum measurements using two quantum key distribution systems and the results are transmitted via free-space optical communication to two agents separated with more than 20 km. The security of the protocol relies on the properties of quantum information and relativity theory. We show that, in each run of the experiment, a bit is successfully committed with less than 5.68*10^-2 cheating probability. Our result demonstrates unconditionally secure bit commitment and the experimental feasibility of relativistic quantum communication.

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Yang Liu, Yuan Cao, Marcos Curty, Sheng-Kai Liao, Jian Wang, Ke Cui, Yu-Huai Li, Ze-Hong Lin, Qi-Chao Sun, Dong-Dong Li, Hong-Fei Zhang, Yong Zhao, Cheng-Zhi Peng, Qiang Zhang, Adan Cabello, Jian-Wei Pan. 2013-06-19. Experimental unconditionally secure bit commitment. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.112.010504

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