Google’s Quantum Supremacy & What It Means For Crypto

By Emre Sokullu on ALTCOIN MAGAZINE

This was originally posted on my personal website

Disclaimer: The Content is for informational purposes only, you should not construe any such information or other material as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice. Nothing contained here constitutes a solicitation, recommendation, endorsement, or offer by me or any third party to buy or sell any securities or other financial instruments in this or in any other jurisdiction in which such solicitation or offer would be unlawful under the securities laws of such jurisdiction.

For those of you who were under a rock, there was a mysterious shocker report last week which implied that Google might have secretly reached quantum-supremacy; in other words, they tested a computing device that was significantly different than the computers we all know and use, and this new architecture proved to be at least one hundred billion (with a B) times faster than the fastest traditional supercomputer in existence today, the Summit.

Not surprisingly, the paper published was taken down a few minutes after. Followed by this news, we’ve seen the Bitcoin’s price crash dramatically to $8000s.

This whopping 20% decrease may sound like nothing super-unusual in the crypto world; after all, it’s been quite a roller-coaster all along. But this one may be different because the mathematical superiority of Sycamore means the doomsday for the secrecy of all private crypto keys in existence. What was once thought to be “finding a particular grain of sand out of all the grains of sand on Earth” by the 2²⁵⁶ possible private keys and their derivatives (e.g., public keys and BTC addresses) does now seem pretty trivial of a task with this super-capable device. After all, if this beefy machine has already proven pseudorandom number generators were indeed random, nothing will stop it from taking on other mathematical challenges in a snap. In other words, if this claim is, as a matter of fact, real -and that is a big if-, all wallets (cold-storage hardware, multi-signature vaults, etc.) are in danger.

Now, before we panic, we should consider a few points:

1. The technology is in good hands — for now. Whether you trust them or not, Google has no interest in your hard-earned money. Google is a company; many of us have already trusted (maybe way too much) and given all of our financial info to them with a blind-eye. We do that with other institutions like banks, too.

2. What’s alarming, though, is the possibility of the sheer presence and feasibility of this technology. In the wrong hands, the asymmetric computing power of quantum computing is as dangerous as the nuclear weapons of cyber-space. Its existence is a game-changer, and the dangers of bad actors misusing it are too much.

3. On this note, it is important to point out the fact that this whole story may be a part of the disinformation campaign between the world’s leading powers. Simply put, as one claims maneuverable hypersonic ICBM, the other responds with another technological milestone.

Although one thing is for certain, if this is indeed true: One of the biggest premises of cryptocurrencies is now dead, and we should accept the reality that Bitcoin is officially no longer invulnerable to seizing. After all, Google is accountable in the jurisdictions it operates, and if PRISM is any indication, they will comply. Secondly, the obscurity and untraceability of BTC ledger are also a now fairytale.

At this point, you may be thinking, “What will happen to my other digital wallets?” such as your online bank or brokerage accounts. The short answer is “They’re safer”. After all, the problem with BTC is that it’s all offline, so there’s nothing that prevents a brute-force attack computing all private keys. This is precisely the type of challenge a narrowly-focused early quantum computer prototype would love to solve. But brute-forcing a remote server is still a difficult feat because any brute-forcing abnormality would be effortlessly detected, so the banks and traditional institutions are relatively better protected.

CoinDesk published an article last weekend that defended BTC’s invulnerability to quantum computing. You should definitely check it out too, and judge for yourself. It is true that crypto-resistant encryption methods are on their way to the Bitcoin protocol, but until then, the implications discussed here will pose a threat. I hope academics can jump in, enlighten us with more information, and prove me wrong.

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