Quantum threat to bitcoin: harvest now, decipher later
Quantum computers could quietly break the bitcoin, and an old pirate says that the countdown has already started.
David Carvalho, a teenage spam pirate in a time, who has become CEO of the Cybersecurity Company Noris Protocol, warns that the cryptographic defenses of the blockchain may not resist the next wave of quantum IT and IA -oriented breakthroughs.
In the center of its warning is a tactic known as “Harvest Now, Decrypt later”, where attackers today store encrypted bitcoin transactions, waiting for future machines to be powerful enough to break the private keys.
Carvalho’s story adds weight to its warnings. He began to hack at 13, later advised NATO and fortune companies 500 before founding the Naoris protocol. Now it sounds the alarm that Bitcoin vulnerabilities with quantum computers are real; Its digital signature algorithm protections (elliptical elliptical curve (ECDSA) could face a silent collapse of Bitcoin systems if the industry hesitates to upgrades.
Did you know? Google’s Willow quantum’s quantum has demonstrated an astonishing speed reference, solving problems in minutes that would take the fastest conventional supervisors around 10²⁵ years.
Bitcoin vulnerabilities to quantum computer science
Bitcoin safety is based on two cryptographic pillars: SHA – 256, which protects the mining process and the integrity of transactions, and ECDSA, which secures private keys behind the signatures considered to be unbreakable by today’s machines.
Under classical calculation, the two systems for one or the other would take more time than the age of the universe, but the quantum threat to Bitcoin changes this equation.
Algorithms like Shor could one day allow a powerful quantum computer to derive a private key from a public key in a few minutes, which makes it possible to divert the funds from any address exposed before a transaction does not regulate.
Security experts point out that cryptocurrency safety does not mean “safe before Q-Jay”. State actors and cybercrime groups are already harvesting data for harvesting now, later decipher the risk of cryptography, quietly building the archives they hope to unlock when the equipment catches up.
The mixture of AI in crypto and quantum technology can significantly accelerate this chronology. Carvalho maintains that AI could help identify the weak points of blockchain cryptography, while quantum material offers raw power to exploit them. This combination – “how AI and quantum could break the bitcoin”, as it framed – could advance the day when current cryptography no longer holds.
The exhibition is already measurable. About 25% to 30% of all Bitcoins – some 6 million to 7 million Bitcoin (BTC) – is in types of addresses inherited such as the Payment -Medical Key (P2PK) or reused P2PK hatches. These formats reveal public keys, instantly leaving them vulnerable once quantum attacks become possible. These dormant and reused pieces represent a huge part of the BTC in circulation and, by extension, the overall stability of bitcoin prices and the bitcoin adoption confidence.
Meanwhile, agencies like the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the National Security Agency already urges a pivot with post-quantum cryptography in crypto, with migration objectives set for 2030-2035 to protect critical systems. If Bitcoin upgrade is upgrading, this could become a global case study in Bitcoin vs Quantum – a confrontation between the first digital active in the world and a new computer class which rewrites the rules for the protection of digital assets and safety of cryptocurrencies.
Carvalho warns that the transition window is already shrinking. Without a decisive update of Bitcoin cryptography and investments in the security of quantum resistant blockchain, he fears that the industry could discover too late that the risk of quantum disturbance was not a distant “day”.
Did you know? Material studies suggest that breaking the ECDSA key from a Bitcoin portfolio in an hour would (optimally) require around 13 million logical qubits (or more than 300 million physical qubits, according to error correction regimes).
The silent collapse of Bitcoin systems?
David Carvalho warns of what he calls a “silent collapse of Bitcoin systems”, a new breed of quantum attacks led by AI which could break signatures, transfer funds and completely bypass detection.
Instead of an affecting feat, these assaults slowly corroded confidence in the blockchain itself, reshaping the sales and consensus without leaving obvious forensic traces.
In this vision, conventional security measures would prove almost useless. Penetration tests, anomaly detection software and even watchdog nodes can all miss the violation. AI could automatically probe the weaknesses of blockchain cryptography, simulate the behavior of the network and adapt its tactics on the fly, while quantum machines discreetly crunch the private keys in the background.
Carvalho’s warning is frank: there will be no live broadcast of a cracking algorithm in action. Instead, integrity would collapse invisibly – missing transactions here, a governance vote quietly, the funds are inexplicably redirected – until the adoption of Bitcoin undergoes a crisis of confidence.
Security of the quantum resistant blockchain, explained
The developers take the quantum threat to Bitcoin seriously, and several defensive efforts are already in motion. However, they reveal how difficult real protection will be.
- BIP-360 (remuneration for resistance at level, or P2QRH) introduces signature schemes and quantum-resistant hybrid address formats. These allow Bitcoin to gradually migrate to post-health cryptography in cryptographic systems, superimposing new protections without breaking the old ones overnight.
- Post-quantum infrastructure companies such as Naoris protocol build decentralized networks designed to integrate the safety of quantum-resistant blockchain directly into transaction layers, combining the detection of threats in real time with cryptography which does not depend on vulnerable elliptical curves.
- The quantum technologies of Deafs such as zero knowledge rolls based on test systems based on hash, which bypasses many low quantum computers, which is supposed to exploit.
But even the best solutions come into a verification of reality: Bitcoin force is its decentralization, which makes radical upgrades difficult. An update of Bitcoin cryptography (in particular one as deep as replacing your basic signature scheme) requires a large agreement between minors, node operators, wallet suppliers and users.
Even after consensus, the migration itself will be slow and disorderly. Millions of users will have to move coins inherited in quantum addresses. If the adoption of the stands, the older parts will remain exposed, undermining the very objective of the safety of cryptocurrencies in the security of cryptography in the quantum era.
Did you know? The layer of subzero Naoris can bolt in virtual virtual compatible blockchains Ethereum within 48 hours, offering post-quantum protections without triggering hard forks or disturbing existing contracts.
Safety of cryptography in the quantum era
Not everyone shares Carvalho’s alarm.
Michael Saylor, executive president of the strategy, rejected the Bitcoin vs quantum narrative as exaggerated. Speaking on CNBC, he formulated it as a “quantum gadget marketing”, stressing that companies like Google or Microsoft will not publish machines capable of breaking their own encryption and that, if necessary, “Bitcoin can simply be upgraded”.
The broader feeling of experts is less disdainful but always measured. Many cryptographers see the horizon of the risk for the vulnerabilities of bitcoin to quantum computers extending a decade or more, with the most cautious estimates pointing to the 2040s. Optimists say that the tipping point may not arrive before 2035 before 2035; Pessimists warn that it could happen within five to 10 years.
Panic is not productive, but complacency could be worse. Most cryptocurrency safety specialists agree that the preparation now of how quantum IT could hack Bitcoin portfolios is much safer than to blur later.
If Bitcoin defenders coordinate on the protection of digital assets today, the transition to post-health cryptography in crypto could resemble controlled upgrade. Delay too long, and it could more like the collapse of “silent collapse” than Carvalho fears.
