No Firewalls or Information Problem for Black Holes Entangled with Large Systems

Abstract

We discuss how under certain conditions the black hole information puzzle and the (related) arguments that firewalls are a typical feature of black holes can break down. We first review the arguments of AMPS favoring firewalls, focusing on entanglements in a simple toy model for a black hole and the Hawking radiation. By introducing a large and inaccessible system entangled with the black hole (representing perhaps a de Sitter stretched horizon or inaccessible part of a landscape) we show complementarity can be restored and firewalls can be avoided throughout the black hole's evolution. Under these conditions black holes do not have an "information problem". We point out flaws in some of our earlier arguments that such entanglement might be generically present in some cosmological scenarios, and call out certain ways our picture may still be realized.

8 pages. V2: We have revised our discussion of the applicability of our results in realistic cosmologies in Section 5. Also, typos fixed and citations added. Our technical results are unchanged. V3: Final version accepted for publication in PRD. Additional references added. No other changes