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Power-consumption back door in quantum key distribution

Beatriz Lopes da Costa1,2,3,4,*, Matías R. Bolaños5, Ricardo Chaves1,6, Claudio Narduzzi5, Marco Avesani5,7, Davide Giacomo Marangon5,7, Andrea Stanco5,7, Giuseppe Vallone5,7, Paolo Villoresi5,7 et al.

Yasser Omar1,2,3,4,†

  • *Contact author: m.beatriz.costa@tecnico.ulisboa.pt
  • †Contact author: contact.yasser@pqi.pt
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Phys. Rev. Applied 24, 054004 – Published 3 November, 2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/f92x-c3zj

Abstract

Over recent decades, quantum key distribution (QKD) has arisen as a promising solution for secure communications; however, like all cryptographic protocols, implementations of QKD can open security vulnerabilities. Until now, the study of physical vulnerabilities in QKD setups has focused primarily on the optical channel. In classical cryptoanalysis, power and electromagnetic side-channel analysis are powerful techniques that can be used to access secret information about the encryption key in symmetric-key algorithms. Such attacks have rarely been used in QKD, since they require an eavesdropper to have access to Alice’s or Bob’s setup; however, security proofs of QKD protocols generally assume that these setups are secure, making it crucial to understand the security measures required to ensure this protection. In this work, we propose and implement a power side-channel analysis of a QKD system by exploiting the power consumption of the electronic driver controlling the electro-optical components of the QKD transmitter. QKD modules typically require very precise electronic drivers, such as field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs). Here, we show that the FPGA’s power consumption can leak information about the QKD operation and consequently the transmitted key. Our results are consistent and show critical information leakage, having reached a maximum accuracy of 73.35% in predicting transmitted qubits at a 100-MHz repetition frequency. We also discuss possible countermeasures to prevent such an attack.

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Phys. Rev. Applied 24, 054004– Published 3 November, 2025
  • Received 15 April 2025
  • Revised 25 July 2025
  • Accepted 5 August 2025
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