Google · Google Research
Safeguarding cryptocurrency by disclosing quantum weaknesses responsibly
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Ryan Babbush, Director of Research, Quantum Algorithms, and Hartmut Neven, VP of Engineering, Google Quantum AI, Google Research.
Key facts
- Variants of Responsible Disclosure with strict deadlines have been adopted by premier security research institutions, such as CERT/CC at Carnegie Mellon University and Google's Project Zero
- Specifically, they have compiled two quantum circuits (a sequence of quantum gates) that implement Shor's algorithm for ECDLP-256: one that uses less than 1,200 logical qubits and 90 million Toffoli
- Ryan Babbush, Director of Research, Quantum Algorithms, and Hartmut Neven, VP of Engineering, Google Quantum AI, Google Research
- The team look forward to continuing their work across the industry following their 2029 timeline alongside others working on responsible approaches, like Coinbase, the Stanford Institute for Blockchain
Summary
They're exploring a new model for how to elucidate the code breaking capabilities of future quantum computers and outlining steps that should be taken to mitigate their consequences. Google has led the responsible transition to post-quantum cryptography since 2016. To share this research responsibly, they engaged with the U.S. government and developed a new method to describe these vulnerabilities via a zero-knowledge proof, so they can be verified without providing a roadmap for bad actors. Quantum computers promise to solve otherwise impossible problems, including examples in chemistry, drug discovery, and energy.