Optional Background Videos:
- Qubits
- Quantum gates
- Measuring qubits in a basis
Week 1: Quantum tools and a first protocol
- Introduction and overview
- Fundamental concepts of quantum information: pure and mixed quantum states, the partial trace, classical-quantum states, generalized measurements
- Encrypting quantum bits with the quantum one-time pad
Week 2: The power of entanglement
- Separable states, entangled states and purification
- Sharing a classical secret using quantum states
- Looking ahead to quantum key distribution: verifying entanglement using a Bell experiment
- Monogamy of entanglement
Week 3: Quantifying information
- What it means to be ignorant: trace distance and its use in security definitions
- The (min)-entropy
- Uncertainty principles as a guessing game
Week 4: From imperfect information to (near) perfect security
- Introduction to privacy amplification
- Strong randomness extractors
- Randomness extraction using two-universal hashing
- A construction of two-universal hash functions
Week 5: Distributing keys
- Introduction to key distribution: the challenge of being correct and secure
- Key distribution over a noisy channel
Guest video: David Elkouss (QuTech, TU Delft) – Practical error correction in key distribution protocols
Week 6: Quantum key distribution protocols
- BB84 Protocol
- Warmup: Security against a classical eavesdropper
- E91 Protocol: purifying protocols using entanglement
- Quantum key distribution: definitions and concepts
Guest video: Nicolas Gisin (University of Geneva) – Quantum key distribution in practice
Week 7: Quantum cryptography using untrusted devices
- Introduction to device-independent quantum cryptography
- Testing devices using a Bell experiment
- Security of device-independent quantum key distribution against collective attacks
Guest video: Ronald Hanson (QuTech, TU Delft) – The first loophole free Bell experiment
Week 8: Quantum cryptography beyond key-distribution
- Introduction and overview
- Two-party cryptography: bit commitment and oblivious transfer
- Impossibility of bit commitment
- Weak commitments and coin tossing
Week 9: Perfect security from physical assumptions
- The noisy storage model
- A simple protocol for bit commitment in the noisy-storage model
- Security from quantum uncertainty
- A universal primitive: weak string erasure
Week 10: Further topics
- Position verification from weak string erasure
- Sharing a quantum secret
- Secure computations on a remote quantum computer
