One-way semi-quantum private comparison protocol without pre-shared keys based on unitary operations

Semi-quantum private comparison is a method for private comparison with fewer quantum resources, enabling classical participants to collaborate with a semi-honest third party possessing complete quantum capabilities. A one-way quantum private comparison protocol is devised only by unitary operations. The protocol facilitates one-way transmission between third party (TP) and classical participants in quantum communication, where the classical participants only need to perform unitary operations and measurement operations on the transmitted qubits. In addition, classical participants do not require pre-shared keys. It is shown that the qubit efficiency of this protocol is 12.5%. Finally, security analysis and the simulation results on the IBM Quantum Experience demonstrate the security and the feasibility of this protocol.