Ever heard of quantum entanglement? If you haven’t, don’t feel bad. As I have written about before, quantum theory is the abstract basis of modern physics. It explains the nature and behavior of how matter acts.
Albert Einstein discovered quantum entanglement in 1935. He said it is "spooky action at a distance." It examines how one quantum particle could affect one another, and that effect is faster than the speed of light. It is one of those advanced/emerging technologies that has been around for a while and is really beginning to show promise.
One of the more interesting applications of this advanced technology is cybersecurity. Many believe it holds the key to what is being called hack-proof digital communications. Basically, this hack-proof capability is based on the principal that an adversary can’t look at the communications without changing or destroying it.
Many world renown scientists believe that China has taken the lead when it comes to quantum communication. Recently, a team of Chinese scientists conducted a quantum entanglement experiment using a satellite and was able to beam entangled pairs of photons to three ground stations located in China about 700 miles apart. Previous work has had similar results, but never has it been done over such a great distance and from a satellite. While this is far from being ready to field, it does represent quite an accomplishment and a huge step forward.
It should be noted that this is just one of a number of China’s strategic initiatives to develop new technology that will create an extremely secure, ultrahigh-speed, quantum-based global communications network. Researchers in several countries, such as the U.S., Canada and Singapore (as well as Google), are also working on a broad spectrum of quantum theory applications including quantum encryption.
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