Development and Analysis of High-Yield Quantum Key Distribution Protocol to Enhance the Key Generation Rate over a Multi-node Network

Abstract

Quantum key distribution is considered the most secure and reliable way to generate public cryptography keys. Quantum key distribution allows users to send and receive data with infallible security. In this Article, bench-marked protocols, such as the BB84 and B92 protocols, are studied and analysed with a focus on overcoming their limitations. The authors attempt to address these shortcomings with their novel QKD protocol, i.e. High-Yield (HY-QKD) Protocol. All these protocols have been implemented and tested using QISKIT, taking into consideration error rate and key length as parameters. Based on the comparison, it has been analysed that the B92 protocol has the lowest key rate, and by introducing multiple channels, the key generation rate increases significantly compared to our proposed High-Yield Quantum Key Distribution (HY-QKD) protocol. Error rates of BB84, B92 and HY-QKD (with Eve present in all the channels) are similar. The error rate in HY-QKD reduces significantly with an increase in the number of paths. If the number of paths is significantly high, Eve's presence in a few channels can be tolerated without affecting the communication. It has been inspected that the HY-QKD protocol’s key generation and error rates directly depend on the number of available channels and Eve(s) attacking. If there is no Eve(s) in the system, the key generation rates for HY-QKD are multiple times higher than that of BB84, validating the proposed HY-QKD protocol.