Amplitude Constrained Vector Gaussian Wiretap Channel: Properties of the Secrecy-Capacity-Achieving Input Distribution

Entropy (Basel). 2023 Apr 30;25(5):741. doi: 10.3390/e25050741.

Abstract

This paper studies the secrecy capacity of an n-dimensional Gaussian wiretap channel under a peak power constraint. This work determines the largest peak power constraint R¯n, such that an input distribution uniformly distributed on a single sphere is optimal; this regime is termed the low-amplitude regime. The asymptotic value of R¯n as n goes to infinity is completely characterized as a function of noise variance at both receivers. Moreover, the secrecy capacity is also characterized in a form amenable to computation. Several numerical examples are provided, such as the example of the secrecy-capacity-achieving distribution beyond the low-amplitude regime. Furthermore, for the scalar case (n=1), we show that the secrecy-capacity-achieving input distribution is discrete with finitely many points at most at the order of R2σ12, where σ12 is the variance of the Gaussian noise over the legitimate channel.

Keywords: MIMO; amplitude constraints; wiretap channel.

Grants and funding

This research received no external funding.