This month is being very exciting for enthusiasts who follow up the current Quantum computers. Xanadu, a young Canadian company founded in 2016, has announced that Plan to have ready before 2030 A quantum computer of one million photonic ulna with error correction. However, it is not the only company that intends to make this milestone come true. IBM plans to make available to its customers in 2029 ‘Starling’its first large -scale quantum computer endowed with the ability to amend your own mistakes.
The main problem facing quantum computers in the field of error correction is noise, understood as the disturbances that can alter the internal state of the cubits and introduce calculation errors. In any case, if finally the correction of errors comes to fruition the prototypes of quantum computers that we have currently will leave behind their status of prototypes and allow us to face really significant problems. And presumably Bitcoin encryption and other cryptocurrencies will fall.
We are facing a worrying challenge
Quantum computer experts have known for several years that quantum computers They will end classical cryptography. That moment came in May 2024. A team of researchers from the University of Shanghai (China) led by Professor Wang Chao used a quantum computer D-Wave for I successfully violate the SPN encryption (Substitation-Permutation Network), which is a cryptographic algorithm that is used to encrypt information.
This encryption is the cornerstone of, for example, the AES standard (Advanced Encryption Standard), which is used a lot. These scientists published the result of their research in An interesting article entitled “Public Cryptographic Attack Algorithm based on quantum processing with the advantage of D-Wave”. However, this is not all. And it is that in the middle of May several Google researchers They published an entry In the blog dedicated to the security of this American company in which they support a crucial premise: an integer RSA (Rivest – Shamir – Adleman) of 2,048 bits can factor in less than a week with a quantum computer of less than one million cubits.
An RSA integer of 2,048 bits can be factor in less than a week with a quantum computer of less than one million cubits
Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana and the other modern cryptocurrencies use a cryptography technique known as elliptical curve that is more robust, efficient and difficult to break than RSA, but its mathematical foundations are similar to those of the latter encryption algorithm. In fact, according to Google scientists signed by the article that I have mentioned above, if the future quantum computers will cost them less than initially breaking the RSA encryption, the cryptography of elliptical curve will also fall with relative ease.
So far we have talked about cryptocurrencies, but it is crucial that we do not overlook that encryption technologies have a fundamental role in our daily lives. In fact, WhatsApp and Telegram use them to encrypt our messages; Banks turn to them to Protect our transactions And every time we buy something on the Internet, it is the encryption that is responsible for protecting our credit card information. These are just some of the applications of this technology.
Keith Martin, professor of the Information Security Group at the University of London (England), has published in The conversation An interesting article in which it addresses this topic. And it reminds us of something important: the threat of quantum computers to encryption technologies is very real, but we have no reason to panic because many researchers have been working on the solution to this challenge for several years. In fact, most of the theoretical work is already done.
In 2024 the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) of the United States published an initial set of standards that includes a post -mecuantic keys exchange mechanism and several postcuantic digital signature schemes. The work that is already done invites us to anticipate that at the time the relevant quantum computers appear from a cryptographic point of view Technologies will already be ready They will be able to protect our information. And in all likelihood these techniques will also be in the hands of quantum computers, such as Juan José García Ripoll holdsResearcher at the Institute of Fundamental Physics of the Higher Council for Scientific Research (CSIC).
Image | IBM
More information | The conversation
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