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The Super-Secure Quantum Cable Hiding in the Holland Tunnel

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posted on Jan, 14 2019 @ 02:57 PM
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Commuters inching through rush-hour traffic in the Holland Tunnel between Lower Manhattan and New Jersey don’t know it, but a technology likely to be the future of communication is being tested right outside their car windows. Running through the tunnel is a fiber-optic cable that harnesses the power of quantum mechanics to protect critical banking data from potential spies.

The cable’s trick is a technology called quantum key distribution, or QKD. Any half-decent intelligence agency can physically tap normal fiber optics and intercept whatever messages the networks are carrying: They bend the cable with a small clamp, then use a specialized piece of hardware to split the beam of light that carries digital ones and zeros through the line.

The people communicating have no way of knowing someone is eavesdropping, because they’re still getting their messages without any perceptible delay. QKD solves this problem by taking advantage of the quantum physics notion that light—normally thought of as a wave—can also behave like a particle.

At each end of the fiber-optic line, QKD systems, which from the outside look like the generic black-box servers you might find in any data center, use lasers to fire data in weak pulses of light, each just a little bigger than a single photon. If any of the pulses’ paths are interrupted and they don’t arrive at the endpoint at the expected nanosecond, the sender and receiver know their communication has been compromised.


The Super-Secure Quantum Cable Hiding in the Holland Tunnel

Now that the cats out of the bag, not so sure the cable is safe. How long till some bozo decides to steal the cable. Think of all the copper that is looted in the Big Apple. Do you think an enterprising crook could find a fence in NYC to sell the cable?



edit on 14-1-2019 by LookingAtMars because: (no reason given)



posted on Jan, 14 2019 @ 03:01 PM
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Sounds like a standard fiber optic cable with fancy hardware at each end. Not sure there is much scrap value in the cable itself.



posted on Jan, 14 2019 @ 03:11 PM
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none at all fiber is not copper



posted on Jan, 14 2019 @ 03:21 PM
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There are Port Authority cops as well as local police on both sides 24 hours a day.

Not to mention a few thousand cameras.



posted on Jan, 14 2019 @ 03:24 PM
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a reply to: midnightstar

Duh, well I guess it is still safe then.



posted on Jan, 14 2019 @ 03:25 PM
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a reply to: midnightstar

Now if you can figure out how to bypass that kinda of security that may get you some bucks but but do not go cutting fiber optic trunk lines unless you have a pile of cash on you . 20 years ago morons digging on a jobsite with me chopped thru a fiber optic trunkline with an excavator it knocked out all credit transactions on eastern side of my state for 24 hours .which meant if you were buying something you better have cash. I had to dry 3 hours away to get my grocery money that night because of them being to cheap to call no cuts.



posted on Jan, 14 2019 @ 03:26 PM
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a reply to: Djarums

You can hide your face from cameras though.



posted on Jan, 14 2019 @ 03:29 PM
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a reply to: Djarums

Guess it's a good thing I am not a thief or in NYC



posted on Jan, 14 2019 @ 03:50 PM
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a reply to: LookingAtMars

It's a long stretched peace of glass.
You may just as well steal empty bottles.
That's just as useless.



posted on Jan, 14 2019 @ 04:22 PM
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originally posted by: Daalder
a reply to: LookingAtMars

It's a long stretched peace of glass.
You may just as well steal empty bottles.
That's just as useless.



Is there a 20cent deposit on a ten thousand foot role of fiber optic cable?



posted on Jan, 14 2019 @ 04:29 PM
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a reply to: Djarums

Do you mean cameras of drivers?
There are cameras in the tubes. Probably every few hunderd yards to monitor for accidents or disabled vehicles.
There are several tunnels in the Hampton Roads area. If the Holland tunnel is monitored like these are no one is stealing anything you are correct.



posted on Jan, 15 2019 @ 01:50 AM
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Sounds like another step in the spv vs spy saga. Not sure how practical it will be over long distances as fiber does need relay stations to help boost the signal, like on the trans Atlantic cable as one example. Have been stories of subs hacking into these cables through the relay points.

It is kinda amazing to hear that communication equipment is starting to be commercialized that can operate at the strength of 1 photon. These developments ain't over yet.



posted on Jan, 15 2019 @ 08:02 PM
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they dont tell you but that tunnel has way more entrances and exits than you realize.
(hint-bunker for rich people)




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