Just lately, Undertaking Eleven (a quantum computing analysis group) introduced a 1 bitcoin reward for the primary staff in a position to full a problem to show breaking a ECC (elliptic curve cryptograph) key utilizing Shor’s algorithm on a quantum pc.
The deadline for this problem is April fifth, 2026, that means in an effort to qualify for the prize a staff should show breaking a key pair it have to be carried out earlier than that deadline.
That is frankly a very absurd and meaningless prize for a variety of causes, the primary of which is the deadline of slightly below a 12 months from right this moment. Even extremely optimistic projections in regards to the progress of quantum computing put the timeline of virtually attaining such a purpose at extra like 5-10 years. Anticipating a workable proof of idea demonstration that truly breaks a keypair in a single 12 months is fairly laughable at face worth, even if you happen to do view quantum computing as a fabric risk within the brief time period.
Subsequent is the issue of financial incentives. A single bitcoin is at the moment value roughly $80,000. That’s frankly not some huge cash within the grand scheme of issues. Particularly in relation to the appliance of a innovative expertise like quantum computing that may carry out a complete class of computation exponentially quicker than a classical pc. Think about how way more precious issues might be carried out with a working quantum pc.
You may listen in on web connections no matter TLS, breaking safe connections to banks, fairness brokerages, personal company networks not utilizing post-quantum cryptography. You may break each personal messenger utility on the planet, you can decrypt any PGP encrypted message despatched over e-mail that you just knew the general public key for. You may break the whole DNS system’s certificates authority hierarchy, permitting you to impersonate any server on the planet a person tries to hook up with.
All of these items have immeasurable worth past only a mere $84,000. Why on Earth would somebody with a working quantum pc publicly reveal that reality to assert a single bitcoin once they might make the most of all these different issues they might be able to doing?
Okay, let’s sweep all of these prospects apart and faux the whole world magically migrates to post-quantum cryptography other than Bitcoin. It nonetheless is unnecessary to attempt to publicly declare this prize when you have a purposeful quantum pc.
Let’s assume you’ve got a barely performant sufficient quantum pc, that it takes a good period of time to crack a single key. What number of naked public keys are there securing 50 BTC outputs from the primary mining epoch? THOUSANDS of them. Why on Earth would you crack one, after which go inform everybody publicly to assert a single bitcoin? You’ll simply attempt to crack as a lot of these early coinbase rewards as potential earlier than individuals detected you.
Lastly, the timetable by itself is simply absurd. Quantum computer systems at the moment will not be even able to factoring prime numbers that folks can do themselves of their heads mentally. In a single 12 months the expertise goes to leap from that to cracking Bitcoin keys? That’s absurd.
So what the hell is the purpose of this prize besides some publicity stunt? It’s completely meaningless as a severe bounty to perform as a canary within the coalmine for us, irrespective of how involved or unconcerned you might be with the timeframes of quantum computer systems as a risk.
This bounty is a joke.
This text is a Take. Opinions expressed are solely the writer’s and don’t essentially replicate these of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Journal.
