{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,4,20]],"date-time":"2026-04-20T13:54:13Z","timestamp":1776693253128,"version":"3.51.2"},"reference-count":35,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"9","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2020,9,9]],"date-time":"2020-09-09T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1599609600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Symmetry"],"abstract":"<jats:p>The security of Quantum Secure Direct Communication (QSDC) and its authentication procedure based on multiple stages is analyzed. The security analysis shows that the process of authentication is required to be done three times based on the usage of unitary transformation that is only known between Alice and Bob. In the proposed protocol, a secure quantum handshake is utilized to share the secret polarization angle and an authentication key at the initial stage of authentication over the quantum channel. The symmetry key is used in this work to protect user data communication within the QSDC protocol, where the same secret key is used to encrypt and decrypt the message. This work adopts the information travel time (ITT) by allowing the sender to detect any interference from third parties. In addition, the operation of the Pauli-X quantum gate increases Eve\u2019s difficulty in stealing the information. The information transmitted is then continued by sending photons once in the quantum channel, which improves the efficiency without losing the message\u2019s security. In addition, to securely transfer the stream of messages, the proposed protocol is operated in single-stage, and the authentication is applied bit-by-bit, thus reducing the transmission time. Security checks are carried out along the data transmission process. Compared to previous protocols, this new initial authentication protocol has remarkable advantages since it does not require public communication to pre-share the authentication key and secret angles before the onset of the transmission, therefore, reducing the communication cost. Moreover, the secret authentication key and polarization angles are updated after a number of bits are sent to increase the security level. The verification process is also conducted to ensure the symmetry of the sender and receiver. The analyses presented herein demonstrate that the proposed authentication protocol is simple and secure in order to ensure the legitimacy of the users.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/sym12091481","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2020,9,10]],"date-time":"2020-09-10T22:58:01Z","timestamp":1599778681000},"page":"1481","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":8,"title":["Multi-Stage Quantum Secure Direct Communication Using Secure Shared Authentication Key"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"12","author":[{"given":"Nur Ziadah","family":"Harun","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Computer Science and Information Technology, University Putra Malaysia, Serdang 43400, Selangor, Malaysia"},{"name":"Department of Information Security and Web Technology, Faculty of Computer Science and Information Technology, University Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia, Parit Raja 86400, Malaysia"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Zuriati","family":"Ahmad Zukarnain","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Computer Science and Information Technology, University Putra Malaysia, Serdang 43400, Selangor, Malaysia"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-8079-1791","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Zurina Mohd","family":"Hanapi","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Computer Science and Information Technology, University Putra Malaysia, Serdang 43400, Selangor, Malaysia"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Idawaty","family":"Ahmad","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Computer Science and Information Technology, University Putra Malaysia, Serdang 43400, Selangor, Malaysia"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2020,9,9]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1","DOI":"10.1103\/PhysRevA.65.032302","article-title":"Theoretically efficient high-capacity quantum-key-distribution scheme G","volume":"65","author":"Long","year":"2002","journal-title":"Phys. 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