Towards practical anonymous quantum communication: A measurement-device-independent approach

Abstract

The multipartite Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ) entangled state is an important resource for anonymous quantum communication tasks. But its low intensity and fragility limit the practical applications of these anonymous communication tasks under current conditions. Here, we present a feasible anonymous communication protocol in the measurement-device-independent framework. We analyze its performance in a quantum network under certain types of noise. Then we compare the performance of our protocol with the GHZ-state-based anonymous protocol. We demonstrate that our protocol has a unique advantage, i.e., it can tolerate an arbitrary number of nonresponsive nodes. We prove that the security of our protocol in an active adversary scenario in which active malicious agents and an untrusted ancillary node are taken into account. Utilizing the measurement-device-independent technology, our proposal suggests an important avenue for practical anonymous quantum communication.