Performance evaluation of Meteor Key Distribution

The Wireless Key Distribution is a fast growing area of applied cryptography covering different approaches of secure distribution of secret encryption key based on channel stochastic properties in specific radio communication systems. To be applicable in key distribution purposes the radio channel must meet the three basic requirements: randomness, reciprocity and spatial selectivity. For a long time it was believed that only the fading channels in multipath environment could satisfy all the three requirements. However, several studies also considered a meteor burst channel as a potential candidate for the secure key distribution at distances up to 2000 km. Unfortunately, a rigorous analysis of meteor radio propagation processes shows that the channel has only approximate reciprocity. This may result in the two legitimate nodes would not be able to generate identical copies of the shared secret key indicating that the Meteor Key Distribution is impossible in practice. In addition, a complicated astronomical nature of the meteor burst channel causes deep diurnal variation in its performance. The aim of our research was a comprehensive evaluation of potential performance of the Meteor Key Distribution systems, taking into account all the physical layer effects of meteor burst channel. We also wanted to clarify, how strong the imperfection of a real meteor burst channel affects the key distribution feasibility.