Hiding Quantum Data

Abstract

Recent work has shown how to use the laws of quantum mechanics to keep classical and quantum bits secret in a number of different circumstances. Among the examples are private quantum channels, quantum secret sharing and quantum data hiding. In this paper we show that a method for keeping two classical bits hidden in any such scenario can be used to construct a method for keeping one quantum bit hidden, and vice--versa. In the realm of quantum data hiding, this allows us to construct bipartite and multipartite hiding schemes for qubits from the previously known constructions for hiding bits. Our method also gives a simple proof that two bits of shared randomness are required to construct a private quantum channel hiding one qubit.

13 pages + 2 figs, submitted to 'David Mermin Festschrift' in Foundations of Physics