Techniques

Denial refers to the technique where the threat actor (Eve) deploys measures to temporarily suspend the use, access, or operation of a system, generally without causing physical damage to the system involved.

Destruction in quantum systems refers to measures taken by the threat actor (Eve) to permanently eliminate the functionality of quantum computing, quantum key distribution (QKD), quantum sensing systems, etc., often through physical damage or irreversible data manipulation.

The laser damage attack employs high-power laser pulses to compromise specific components within a quantum communication system. This type of attack can result in various outcomes, including the creation of backdoors for further quantum attacks like photon number splitting (PNS) or Trojan-horse attacks, degradation of system performance (e.g., reduced detector efficiency), or a Denial-of-Service (DoS) situation, such as completely blinding a detector.

The threat actor (Eve) manipulates the classical signal used for phase-reference alignment in CV-QKD systems, exploiting the trusted phase noise model to increase correlations with the secret key while masking her influence.