Beijing - China will launch the world's longest quantum communication network by 2016, news reports said on Tuesday.
The network will link the 2 000 kilometres from Beijing to Shanghai, scientists were quoted as saying by the South China Morning Post.
“China's quantum information science and technology is developing very fast and China leads in some areas in this field,” Pan Jianwei, professor at the University of Science and Technology of China, was quoted as saying by Xinhua news agency.
Such networks rely on quantum communication technology, which is considered almost unhackable, and has not been deployed across such a wide area before.
Any attempt to access the encryption is immediately detected by the system, but the sensitivity of quantum connections makes it difficult to keep them stable over long distances.
China aims to build an Asia-Europe quantum network by 2020, and a global one by 2030, Pan, a lead scientist of the national quantum communication project, said at an international conference on the topic in the eastern Chinese city of Hebei, Xinhua reported.
China also plans to put up the world's first quantum communication satellite in 2016, the South China Morning Post earlier reported. Current quantum networks use fibre optic cables.
Quantum networks are suitable for highly sensitive financial, diplomatic or military communications.
Governments in Europe, Japan and Canada are planning their own quantum communication satellites, and one private company in the United States is seeking federal funding for a network linking several major cities, the South China Morning Post reported. - Sapa-dpa