A novel extension of SSL/TLS based on quantum key distribution

This paper presents a novel extension of SSL/TLS that significantly facilitates the integration of quantum key distribution (QKD) with the already-existing Internet security infrastructure. This extended version of SSL/TLS is called QSSL (quantum SSL). During the development of QSSL, a concentration has been made on the creation of a simple, efficient, general, and flexible architecture that enables the deployment of practical quantum cryptographic-based security applications. Indeed, QSSL efficiently supports unconditionally secure encryption (one-time pad) and/or unconditionally secure authentication (based on universal hashing). A simplified version of QSSL based on BB84 (Bennett-Brassard 1984) QKD protocol has also been implemented and experimentally tested.