{
  "abstract": "Secret key generation from correlated observations at Alice and Bob, in the presence of an eavesdropper Eve, underpins physical-layer security. Classical pipelines quantize by hand, amplify privacy afterwards, and optimize no objective tied to a key rate. We propose Variational Probabilistic Quantization (VPQ): neural encoders that map the correlated sources directly into a discrete key alphabet, trained by a variational adversarial objective whose entropy, mismatch, and leakage terms match the three terms of the one-way secret key rate. A linear code-offset secure sketch then reconciles the encoder outputs into an identical key without a separate privacy amplification step. We prove that the VPQ losses lower-bound the one-way secret key capacity of the induced source, and derive in closed form the optimal worst-case key rate over the source class of a given alphabet size and mismatch probability, attained by finite-field linear sketches. On Gaussian fading channels, VPQ leaks less to a correlated eavesdropper than one classical and two recent learning-based baselines, and Reed--Solomon reconciliation operates within the predicted finite-blocklength gap.",
  "abstract_shown": true,
  "affiliations": [],
  "article_type": null,
  "arxiv": "2609.03205",
  "author_total": 6,
  "authors": [
    {
      "name": "Xinyang Li"
    },
    {
      "name": "Vlad C. Andrei"
    },
    {
      "name": "Peter J. Gu"
    },
    {
      "name": "Yiqi Chen"
    },
    {
      "name": "Ullrich J. Mönich"
    },
    {
      "name": "Holger Boche"
    }
  ],
  "bibtex": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/fwgfy8732z8xw.bib",
  "cited_by": 0,
  "doi": "10.48550/arxiv.2609.03205",
  "fulltext_url": null,
  "id": "fwgfy8732z8xw",
  "issns": [],
  "landing_url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.03205",
  "language": null,
  "licence": "LicenseRef-arXiv-nonexclusive-1.0",
  "licence_label": "arXiv licence",
  "licence_source": "article",
  "licence_url": "http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/",
  "metadata_licence": "CC0-1.0",
  "native_subjects": [
    [
      "arxiv",
      "cs.IT"
    ],
    [
      "arxiv",
      "math.IT"
    ],
    [
      "openalex",
      "2208|Wireless Communication Security Techniques"
    ]
  ],
  "openalex": "W7208758555",
  "pdf_url": "https://arxiv.org/pdf/2609.03205",
  "pmcid": null,
  "pmid": null,
  "published": "2026-09-02",
  "publisher": null,
  "ris": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/fwgfy8732z8xw.ris",
  "sources": [
    {
      "first_seen": "2026-10-30T12:18:36Z",
      "native_id": "2609.03205",
      "source": "arxiv",
      "url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.03205"
    }
  ],
  "subjects": [
    {
      "field": "mathematics",
      "origin": "arxiv:math.IT",
      "subfield": "general"
    }
  ],
  "title": "Variational Probabilistic Quantization for Secret Key Generation",
  "title_text": "Variational Probabilistic Quantization for Secret Key Generation",
  "type": "preprint",
  "updated_at": "2026-10-30T12:18:36Z",
  "url": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/fwgfy8732z8xw",
  "venue": "arXiv",
  "versions": []
}