Patent ID: 7450719

Claim:
A Gigabit Ethernet-based passive optical network comprising: an Optical Line Terminal (OLT) for receiving a public key through transmission medium, encrypting a secret key by means of the received public key, transmitting the encrypted secret key, encrypting data by means of the secret key, and transmitting the encrypted data, the OLT being located in a service provider-side; and an Optical Network Terminal (ONT) for transmitting the public key to the OLT, receiving the encrypted secret key transmitted from the OLT, decrypting the encrypted secret key by means of a private key residing in an ONT key management unit of the ONT for managing a public key and the private key, receiving the encrypted data, and decrypting the received encrypted data by means of the decrypted secret key, wherein the public key is used for encrypting the secret key, the secret key is encrypted by means of the public key, and the data is encrypted by the OLT by means of the secret key.