Digital signatures ensure the integrity of a classical message and the authenticity of its sender. Despite their far-reaching use in modern communication, currently used signature schemes rely on computational assumptions and will be rendered insecure by a quantum computer. We present a quantum digital signatures (QDS) scheme whose security is instead based on the impossibility of perfectly and deterministically distinguishing between quantum states. Our continuous-variable (CV) scheme relies on phase measurement of a distributed alphabet of coherent states and allows for secure message authentication against a quantum adversary performing collective beamsplitter and entangling-cloner attacks. Crucially, in the CV setting we allow for an eavesdropper on the quantum channels and yet retain shorter signature lengths than previous protocols with no eavesdropper. This opens up the possibility to implement CV QDS alongside existing CV quantum key distribution platforms with minimal modification.

Agile cryptography allows for a resource-efficient swap of a cryptographic core in case the security of an underlying classical cryptographic algorithm becomes compromised. Conversely, versatile cryptography allows the user to switch the cryptographic task without requiring any knowledge of its inner workings. In this paper, we suggest how these related principles can be applied to the field of quantum cryptography by explicitly demonstrating two quantum cryptographic protocols, quantum digital signatures (QDS) and quantum secret sharing (QSS), on the same hardware sender and receiver platform. Crucially, the protocols differ only in their classical postprocessing. The system is also suitable for quantum key distribution (QKD) and is highly compatible with deployed telecommunication infrastructures, since it uses standard quadrature phase-shift keying encoding and heterodyne detection. For the first time, QDS protocols are modified to allow for postselection at the receiver, enhancing protocol performance. The cryptographic primitives QDS and QSS are inherently multipartite, and we prove that they are secure not only when a player internal to the task is dishonest, but also when (external) eavesdropping on the quantum channel is allowed. In our first proof-of-principle demonstration of an agile and versatile quantum communication system, the quantum states are distributed at GHz rates. A 1-bit message may be securely signed using our QDS protocols in less than 0.05 ms over a 2-km fiber link and in less than 0.2 s over a 20-km fiber link. To our knowledge, this also marks the first demonstration of a continuous-variable direct QSS protocol.

Quantum state sharing (QSS) is a protocol by which a (secret) quantum state may be securely split into shares, shared between multiple potentially-dishonest players, and reconstructed. Crucially, the players are each assumed to be dishonest, and so QSS requires that only a collaborating authorized subset of players can access the original secret state; any dishonest unauthorized conspiracy cannot reconstruct it. We analyze a QSS protocol involving three untrusted players and demonstrate that quantum steering is the required resource enabling the protocol to proceed securely. We analyze the level of steering required to share any single-mode Gaussian secret which enables the states to be shared with the optimal use of resources.

We suggest and discuss a concept of a deterministic integrated source of nonclassical light based on the coherent diffusive photonics, a coherent light flow in a system of dissipatively coupled waveguides. We show how this practical quantum device can be realized with a system of single-mode waveguides laser inscribed in nonlinear glass. We describe a hierarchy of models, from the complete multimode model of the waveguide network to the single mode coupled to a bath, analyze the conditions for validity of the simplest single-mode model and demonstrate feasibility of the generation of bright sub-Poissonian light states merely from a coherent input. Notably, the generation of nonclassical states occurs at the initial stages of the dynamics, and can be accounted for in the linear model that allows us to circumvent the prohibiting computational complexity of the exact full quantum representation.

We present a theoretical proposal for an integrated four-wave mixing source of narrow-band path-entangled photon pairs with efficient spatial pump self-rejection. The scheme is based on correlated loss in a system of waveguides in Kerr nonlinear media. We calculate that this setup gives the possibility for upwards of 100 dB pump rejection, without additional filtering. The effect is reached by driving the symmetric collective mode that is strongly attenuated by an engineered dissipation, while photon pairs are born in the antisymmetric mode. A similar set-up can additionally be realized for the generation of two-photon NOON states, also with pump self-rejection. We discuss the implementation of the scheme by means of the coherent diffusive photonics, and demostrate its feasibility in both glass (such as fused silica-glass and IG2) and planar semiconductor waveguide structures in indium phosphide (InP) and in silicon.

We present a scheme for an integrated four-wave mixing source of narrow-band path-entangled photon pairs with efficient spatial pump self-rejection. The scheme is based on correlated loss in a system of waveguides in Kerr nonlinear media. We demonstrate that this setup allows for upwards of 100dB pump rejection, without additional filtering. The effect is reached by driving the symmetric collective mode that is strongly attenuated by an engineered dissipation, while photon pairs are born in the antisymmetric mode. A similar set-up can additionally be realized for generation of two-photon NOON states, also with pump self-rejection. We discuss implementation of the scheme by means of the coherent diffusive photonics, and demostrate its feasibility both in glass (such as fused silica-glass and IG2), and planar semiconductor waveguide structures in indium phosphide (InP) and in silicon.