What is quantum-resistant communications?
Securing the future
Robust network security is essential to protect sensitive data in motion. While today’s most advanced encryption algorithms used to secure user data remain strong, the key exchange protocols that enable this encryption are vulnerable to future quantum attacks. Currently, secret keys used for encryption and decryption are exchanged through protocols that could be compromised by emerging quantum technology. Although today’s quantum computers lack the capability to break these protocols, the risk remains that encrypted data stored today could be decrypted once quantum computing advances. This is why governments and organizations worldwide are exploring quantum-resistant cryptography to protect their information from future quantum-enabled threats.
The post-quantum world
Hackers using quantum computers may be able to crack the most secure key exchange algorithms currently in use.
Our FSP 3000 and FSP 150 devices have already begun to protect networks against the looming quantum threat.
Quantum-safe key exchange
New post-quantum algorithms, along with quantum-based key exchange technologies, offer robust solutions for quantum-safe encryption.
Quantum key distribution (QKD) and post-quantum cryptography (PQC)
While symmetric encryption, which protects sensitive data, remains secure, the conventional asymmetric key exchange methods used to generate encryption keys are highly vulnerable to quantum-enabled attacks. Quantum key distribution (QKD) addresses this by using quantum information (qubits) to securely exchange keys between two parties. Alternatively, post-quantum cryptography (PQC) leverages mathematical problems that even quantum computers cannot solve, providing a quantum-resistant solution. PQC has the added advantage of being deployable with standard processors and existing communication networks. In many cases, QKD and PQC can be combined with classical key exchange protocols, creating hybrid models that offer both present-day protection and future-proof security against quantum threats.
A quantum leap in data protection
Adtran’s FSP 3000 and FSP 150 platforms, hardened with technology from Adva Network Security, have been at the heart of several breakthrough trials of quantum-safe networking.
A secure tomorrow today
With our partner Adva Network Security, we at Adtran are committed to delivering security solutions that safeguard data from all types of cyberattacks, including those enabled by quantum computing. Our FSP 3000 open line system and FSP 150 Ethernet solution, equipped with ConnectGuard™ encryption technology from Adva Network Security, have been successfully tested with quantum-resistant implementations of both QKD and PQC. We’re also among the first to adopt the new ETSI key delivery interface standard, enabling the seamless integration of QKD-based encryption keys into commercial hardware encryptors. Positioned to play a pivotal role in the ongoing fight to ensure data privacy, our pioneering FSP 3000 and FSP 150 platforms are setting a new benchmark in the industry.
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