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arXiv · 2502.02445

Quantum-enabled framework for the Advanced Encryption Standard in the post-quantum era

Albert Nieto-Morales·Arit Kumar Bishwas·Joel Jacob Varghese
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Abstract

The Advanced Encryption Standard (AES)-256 remains resistant to known quantum key-search attacks when keys are uniformly generated. We present quantum-enabled AES (QE-AES), a key-management wrapper that provisions unmodified AES-256 with output delivered by a commercial quantum random-number generator and periodically replaces epoch keys. Evaluation covers Special Publication 800-90B diagnostics on vendor-processed output, capture-backed performance, a live delivery probe, and a simulated correlation-power-analysis model. QE-AES does not enlarge the AES key space or provide masking; it supplies a separate source path and bounds key reuse under an independent-epoch assumption. Entropy delivery, rather than AES, is the principal performance constraint.

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Albert Nieto-Morales, Arit Kumar Bishwas, Joel Jacob Varghese. 2025-02-04. Quantum-enabled framework for the Advanced Encryption Standard in the post-quantum era. https://arxiv.org/abs/2502.02445

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