Some computer scientists say quantum computers are moving closer to reality and will cripple bitcoin’s encryption systems and doom bitcoin. Governments are investing aggressively in quantum computers, which are ultra powerful.
Andersen Cheng, co-founder of Post Quantum, a U.K. cybersecurity firm, told Newsweek that bitcoin will end the day the first quantum computer arrives. He said the quantum computer will undermine the cryptography surrounding bitcoin’s public and private keys.
Martin Tomlinson, a professor at the Security, Communications and Networking Research Centre in Plymouth University, said a quantum computer can calculate the private key from the public one in a minute or two. By learning all the private keys, someone would have access to all available bitcoin.
What Can Be Done? To protect bitcoin from quantum computers, new cryptography standards must be incorporated into the bitcoin protocol. Such technologies exist already. Llew Claasen, executive director of the Bitcoin Foundation, said many cryptographers already are working on a solution to phase in quantum-proof technologies to the bitcoin network.
Bitcoin is doomed, according to Tomlinson. Any disruption that requires the bitcoin community’s consensus, something that can’t even be accomplished with the cryptocurrency’s transaction limit problem. The transaction limit problem is simple compared to reworking the complete digital signature method, Tomlinson said.