# Why does the BB84 paper "Quantum cryptography: Public key distribution and coin tossing" have a 'withdrawn' status?

The original paper proposing quantum key distribution protocol (now known as BB84):

seems to have WITHDRAWN status with a note:

This article has been withdrawn at the request of the author(s) and/or editor. The Publisher apologizes for any inconvenience this may cause. The full Elsevier Policy on Article Withdrawal can be found at http://www.elsevier.com/locate/withdrawalpolicy.

Is it known why the paper was withdrawn, and is there any way to still access the paper?

Is it known if it is the same paper (the date is 28 September 2011 rather than anything in 1984)?

• One of the reason's for withdrawal in press is "accidental duplicate" which may explain the date issue. Jul 17 '14 at 14:35
• This question appears to be off-topic because it is about publication dates rather than physics Aug 22 '14 at 20:11
• The real question is: why was this article reprinted by Theoretical Computer Science 27 years after the original publication date, apparently without the publisher having obtained adequate copyright permissions? Oct 28 '14 at 1:36
• @PeterShor I saw a few times an article being republished (I have no idea about its practical or legal side; especially I don't track which small journal/conference is owned by another). For an example, see this reprint of the original Shannon paper: dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=584093. Oct 28 '14 at 7:38