A Survey of Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) Network Simulation Platforms

The exponential development in Quantum Computing is becoming a threat to the existing asymmetric cryptographic algorithms like RSA (Rivest, Shamir, Adleman). A threat to these public key cryptographic algorithms is a threat to the entire Internet itself, as algorithms like RSA are the basic building blocks of existing secure Internet communication. Thus, a new area of quantum cryptography emerged, that lead to the development of Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC) algorithms and Quantum-safe Internet protocol Quantum Key Distribution (QKD). These systems, which are generally known as Quantum Cryptographic Systems, have many practical limitations that make them complex and expensive to be implemented or even experimented with, in a real-life scenario. Therefore, to develop new protocols and analyze the feasibility of the existing protocols in a cost-effective manner, we need efficient simulation frameworks. So, in this paper, we are profiling some of the recent Quantum Cryptographic based networks and Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) simulation frameworks and conducting a systematic and thorough analysis of the implementation and functionalities of these experimental platforms, with an aim to build a universal quantum testbed in the future.