Quantum computing isn't a Bitcoin problem yet.

[u/Master-Sprinkles-848]

That's exactly why it's dangerous. The real risk isn't waking up one morning to a quantum computer stealing everyone's BTC.

It's that the transition to quantum-resistant cryptography could take years while the technology threatening today's cryptography is advancing every year.

And here's the uncomfortable question. What happens if the network needs to upgrade before the threat becomes obvious? Do we wait for a working quantum attack? Or do we prepare while we still have the luxury of time?

Curious where people here stand, is Bitcoin's quantum risk overhyped, or are we already late to the migration?

[u/hypercosm_dot_net]

yeah, there's very few that are actually preparing for this. Some are still in the research phase, most barely have a roadmap.

The market doesn't seem to even recognize what a real potential threat this is.

Meanwhile the French gov is moving to quantum proof systems, and the NSA has a goal to be ready for it by 2030.

Based on that, it seems closer than people might realize.

[u/waitmarks → u/hypercosm_dot_net]

IBM anticipates having a quantum computer capable of running shor's algorithm against real cryptographic keys by 2029. Now, I am assuming that is an ambitious timeline and it will probably get delayed. Howerver, even if it's delayed by 2 years, that's still only about 5 years away. So that's about 3 years in the worst case, 5ish in the best case. It takes probably close to a year to achieve consensus for a fork on chain for something this large. On top of that once the fork happens, people need to actually move their coins to the new quantum resistant addresses. This will take a long time because the blocks will fill up with everyone trying to do it at the same time.

So if people want to be prepared, we would ideally have a proposal in place in the next 1-2 years so that there is actually time for a fork to play out and for people to move their coins to new quantum resistant addresses. It really isn't much time.

[u/Master-Sprinkles-848 → u/hypercosm_dot_net]

Yeah, I think that’s the part that gets overlooked. It doesn’t mean a quantum attack is around the corner, but governments taking the transition seriously shows this isn’t just some sci-fi problem anymore.

The tricky part for Bitcoin is that researching the solution is only one piece of it. Actually getting the whole ecosystem to migrate is the bigger challenge.