A directional wave measurement attack against the Kish key distribution system

Abstract

The Kish key distribution system has been proposed as a classical alternative to quantum key distribution. The idealized Kish scheme elegantly promises secure key distribution by exploiting thermal noise in a transmission line. However, we demonstrate that it is vulnerable to nonidealities in its components, such as the finite resistance of the transmission line connecting its endpoints. We introduce a novel attack against this nonideality using directional wave measurements, and experimentally demonstrate its efficacy.