Quantum private query: A new kind of practical quantum cryptographic protocol

Abstract

This research aims to review the developments in the field of quantum private query (QPQ), a type of practical quantum cryptographic protocol. The primary protocol, as proposed by Jacobi et al., and the improvements in the protocol are introduced. Then, the advancements made in sability, theoretical security, and practical security are summarized. Additionally, we describe two new results concerning QPQ security. We emphasize that a procedure to detect outside adversaries is necessary for QPQ, as well as for other quantum secure computation protocols, and then briefly propose such a strategy. Furthermore, we show that the shift-and-addition or low-shift-and-addition technique can be used to obtain a secure real-world implementation of QPQ, where a weak coherent source is used instead of an ideal single-photon source.