## Cryptology ePrint Archive: Report 2006/148

Computational Indistinguishability between Quantum States and Its Cryptographic Application

Akinori Kawachi and Takeshi Koshiba and Harumichi Nishimura and Tomoyuki Yamakami

Abstract: We introduce a computational problem of distinguishing between two specific quantum states as a new cryptographic problem to design a quantum cryptographic scheme that is secure'' against any polynomial-time quantum adversary. Our problem QSCDff is to distinguish between two types of random coset states with a hidden permutation over the symmetric group of finite degree. This naturally generalizes the commonly-used distinction problem between two probability distributions in computational cryptography. As our major contribution, we show three cryptographic properties: (i) QSCDff has the trapdoor property; (ii) the average-case hardness of QSCDff coincides with its worst-case hardness; and (iii) QSCDff is computationally at least as hard in the worst case as the graph automorphism problem. These cryptographic properties enable us to construct a quantum public-key cryptosystem, which is likely to withstand any chosen plaintext attack of a polynomial-time quantum adversary. We further discuss a generalization of QSCDff, called QSCDcyc, and introduce a multi-bit encryption scheme relying on the cryptographic properties of QSCDcyc.

Category / Keywords: foundations / quantum cryptography, computational indistinguishability, trapdoor property, worst-case/average-case equivalence, graph automorphism problem, quantum public-key cryptosystem

Date: received 14 Apr 2006, last revised 17 May 2006

Contact author: kawachi at is titech ac jp

Available format(s): Postscript (PS) | Compressed Postscript (PS.GZ) | PDF | BibTeX Citation

Note: References are added.

Short URL: ia.cr/2006/148

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