Jerry Horgan

Ticket based authentication systems are used across the internet. They allow an entity or device to be issued a ticket which can be used to repeated authenticate to a service. We propose a quantum ticket algorithm (based on Gavinsky's coin scheme [1]) which offers protection against phishing, replay and man-in-the-middle attacks, and authentication with the service does not require either quantum or encrypted communication channels. It also provides in-built ticket expiration and graded step-up authentication depending on levels of trust and risk.