Commercial quantum computers may be able to crack the elliptic curve keys securing Bitcoin wallets in about five years. This perspective was shared by Pierre-Luc Dallaire-Demers, a scientist from the University of Calgary, in a conversation with DLNews.
The expert refers to ECDSA 256 encryption, which protects addresses and signs transactions using pairs of public and private keys.
“Cracking these keys is one of the simplest applications for large quantum computers,” he emphasized.
ECDSA 256 is vulnerable to Shor’s algorithm, which allows for the efficient factorization of large numbers into primes and can break the private keys of cryptocurrency wallets. This algorithm represents a significant breakthrough in quantum computing, as it solves the problem of number factorization in polynomial time, whereas classical algorithms handle this task in exponential time.
Another encryption algorithm in the Bitcoin network, SHA-256, which allows miners to hash and add blocks to the network through Proof-of-Work, can be fixed by doubling the hash length. This view was expressed by experts from the digital asset firm Galaxy.
However, protection against Shor’s algorithm requires fundamental changes in Bitcoin’s cryptography.
Billions of Satoshis at Risk
The first to suffer from quantum computers will be the wallets of early Bitcoin users, including Satoshi Nakamoto. They still use the early P2PK format, which fully reveals the public key, giving attackers time for a brute-force attack.
Modern addresses like P2PKH are better protected, as they only publish the key hash.
In light of this, Ava Labs founder and CEO Emin Gün Sirer proposed freezing Satoshi Nakamoto’s 1 million BTC.
Early Bitcoin users can avoid hacking by transferring coins from old addresses to newly generated ones.
“If people still have coins in P2PK addresses, they should immediately move their assets,” Dallaire-Demers stressed.
The Threat is Real
Concerns about the quantum threat resurfaced in December when Google Quantum AI specialists unveiled the latest quantum chip, Willow. It performed a standard benchmark calculation in less than five minutes. One of the fastest modern supercomputers, Frontier, would take 10 septillion years for the same task — a number far exceeding the age of the universe.
“A quantum computer will crack Bitcoin if we don’t upgrade it. The threat is real,” stated Charles Edwards, founder of the hedge fund Capriole Investments.
Back in October, Chinese scientists conducted the “world’s first effective attack” on a widely used encryption algorithm using a quantum computer.
Later, experts claimed that the threat of a quantum attack on cryptocurrencies is exaggerated.