What is quantum technology?
Quantum technology can process an enormous amount of data and solve complex problems in seconds rather than decades.
Remarkably, quantum technology first appeared in the early 1900s. It originated from quantum mechanics, a branch of physics that examines how matter and energy behave at extremely small scales, such as atoms and subatomic particles.
In the real world, it’s applied in modern technologies such as transistors, lasers, MRI machines and quantum computers. These are said to be 300,000 times faster and more powerful than the ones used nowadays. Google’s new quantum chip, Willow, cuts computation times significantly and may provide hackers with the tools to unlock the algorithms that support Bitcoin and other cryptos.
Quantum computers could threaten Bitcoin’s cryptographic systems, including the Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm (ECDSA). Experts such as Adam Back and Michael Saylor argue that quantum threats to Bitcoin aren’t a concern at present because such applications require advanced quantum hardware, which may take years, if not decades, to develop.
Research and development of quantum computers is running at a fast pace, but is Bitcoin quantum-safe at this stage? Not yet, but developers are working to upgrade the network to mitigate possible quantum risks, including breaking encryption.
While it’s important to acknowledge the risks, it’s also essential to clarify that these are far from being actual threats for now.
Did you know? Albert Einstein made significant contributions to the development of quantum technology. He set the ground for quantum mechanics with his work on the photoelectric effect, which revealed what light is made of. He won the Nobel Prize for this, and not for the relativity theory, as many believe.
How quantum tech could break Bitcoin wallets
Quantum computing could significantly impact Bitcoin. This is mainly because it could undermine the cryptography that protects its network.
Quantum computing and Bitcoin (BTC) have been a hot topic for a while, and rightly so. It can disrupt the network and potentially break Bitcoin wallets by exploiting vulnerabilities in the asymmetric cryptography that secures them. Specifically, the ECDSA, the asymmetric cryptography used in Bitcoin, is vulnerable to attacks by quantum computers.
Bitcoin wallets are secured by ECDSA to generate a pair of private-public keys. Its security relies on the hard-to-solve elliptic curve discrete logarithm problem (ECDLP), which is impossible to resolve with classical computers.
Bitcoin private key cracking with quantum computers is the real issue since private keys control your Bitcoin. If you lose them, you lose your money. When a private-public key pair is generated, the public key is set for verification, and the private key is for signing.
In 1994, mathematician Peter Shor created the Shor quantum algorithm, which can break the perceived security of the algorithms in asymmetric cryptography. All existing algorithms would require a huge amount of time, money and resources to derive a private key from the public key. However, the Shor algorithm will accelerate the process.
This means that when a person, organization or anyone with a strong quantum computer will be able to use the Shor algorithm, they may generate a private key from a public one and fake digital signatures for transactions.
Bitcoin and quantum security risk
You’ve learned by now that quantum tech could compromise Bitcoin wallets by revealing their private keys. This risk becomes more significant as quantum computers advance, especially for wallets linked to older addresses or those with reused public keys. Quantum computing could make it possible to reverse-engineer private keys from these exposed public keys, threatening the security of Bitcoin holders.
In 2025, quantum computers are supposedly decades away from breaking ECDSA. Even Michael Saylor believes the concerns to be unjustified. Bitcoin users can sit back and relax for now, but they should be aware of the best practices to handle any future quantum threats to Bitcoin.
Here’s a concise breakdown of the relationship between quantum computing and Bitcoin:
Did you know? Quantum computing progress can be assessed by the number of qubits (basic units of information) in one processor. Today, the most powerful quantum computers process between 100 and 1,000 qubits. Estimates for the number of qubits needed to break Bitcoin’s security range from 13 million to 300 million or more.
Can quantum computers recover lost Bitcoin?
Analysts think that between 2.3 million and 3.7 million Bitcoin is permanently lost. This is about 11%-18% of the total fixed supply of 21 million.
What happens to lost Bitcoin when quantum recovery technologies allow dormant wallets to come back to life? Think of Satoshi Nakamoto’s coins alone, which are estimated to be 1 million. If a quantum computer cracks their wallet and releases the coins…
cointelegraph.com