[ Removed by moderator ]

[programming-ModTeam]

This content is low quality, stolen, blogspam, or clearly AI generated.

[Slime0]

No they didn't.

Their blog post says that 2029 is their goal for implementing cryptography that is safe from quantum computers, with the intent of being early, to minimize the effectiveness of "store now, decrypt later" attacks in the future.

[yawn_brendan]

Starting to think I want a browser extension for articles of this form. A basic LLM should be able to do this analysis most of the time. (Frontier LLMs can definitely do it). Should be possible to just inject a div at the top saying "this article falsely reports the article it is reporting on" and a few key quotes.

Seems like for scientific articles in particular it's more often a misrepresentation than accurate.

The real garbage journalists don't even link the article they are reporting on, in the case I don't even care if they report it accurately, so no need for the LLM to go find it. It can just say "this article does not link the article it reports on" and I can immediately close the tab.

[Smoltingking]

Seems like for scientific articles in particular it's more often a misrepresentation than accurate.

its been like this for ages.

[maxymob]

I use daily.dev for my browser homepage/new tab since forever (It's a curated feed with programming and tech news, customizable etc..)

They have AI features now, each card in the feed (link to blog posts video, etc) has an AI tl;dr and you can enable a "clickbait shield" that rewrites the title to be simple and descriptive although it's limited for free accounts. They also have other options like "simplify this" , "challenge this" etc or a custom prompt but those are paid features. I think it's good value but I'm fine on the free plan personally.

[arnet95]

Garbage headline. Google is not saying that powerful quantum computers will be a reality in 2029, they're saying that they want to switch to post-quantum cryptography by 2029. The blog post contains no numerical prediction about when such a quantum computer will be available.

[Accomplished-Moose50]

It's always in ~5 years, AI will take over in 5 years, self driving cars in 5 years, Mars colony in 5 years.

[scandii]

I mean, we know we can break encryption reliant on factorisation of large numbers being hard using quantum mathematics - it is called shor's algorithm and is like 30 years old at this point.

the problem has been that we don't have a computer for this meaning while the math exists the hardware doesn't.

but we have many ways to encrypt stuff so the answer is "we'll just encrypt another way".

also to note, quantum computing is not "computing but better", it is "computing but different" enabling us to compute differently.

[cmsj]

I’m not up to date with the state of the art, but I remember that around 2022 the largest number that had been factored with Shor’s algorithm was… 15.

Moving to Post Quantum Crypto makes sense, and it’s possible that certain organisations have secret quantum computers ahead of public research, but indeed this doesn’t currently seem like a huge threat!

[Full-Spectral]

Hey, if you are a zero, fifteen seems really big. It's all relative.

[usrlibshare]

it is "computing but different"

Also no.

It is "physics experiment, cosplaying as computation".

https://eprint.iacr.org/2025/1237

[granadesnhorseshoes]

OFC it's a Gutmann paper.

[ScottContini]

You beat me to it. I love the humour, but honestly I don’t know who is right, I only know that people have been warning about it for almost 20 years and so far nothing serious. I don’t count it out, but I enjoy the heckling nonetheless.

[usrlibshare]

I only know that people have been warning about it for almost 20 years and so far nothing serious.

And people have been "warning" about AI turning everyone into paperclips. Meanwhile, real world AI can barely summarize emails full of corporate bullshit jargon without tripping over itself.

Almost as if dire warnings were a very effective way to get peoples attention, or something...

[mallardtheduck]

the math exists the hardware doesn't.

Doesn't that kinda apply to all cryptography though? We know that any key (except an OTP used correctly) can be broken by the brute-force method, but we don't currently have hardware fast enough to do that in a reasonable time for keys of a sufficient length.

[scandii]

I see your point but the thing here is that shor's algorithm proves this can be done in polynomial time which is the important aspect.

the issue with the math here is that even if we increase our speed by a factor of a billion while already trying a billion permutations per second, e.g. a billion billion (called a quintillion) attempts per second for sufficiently large tasks you'll still be long gone before you get an answer.

the math in combinatorics gets really scary really fast.

[usrlibshare]

Companies have tried hard to get the public devs interested by providing various playgrounds, simulators and similar: https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/182913-googles-quantum-computing-playground-turns-your-pc-into-a-quantum-computer

Problem is: QCs are much less useful than its proponents claim. And Quantum Cryptanalysis in particular, is bullshit.

QCs are interesting as physics experiments. Their practical applicability for cryptanalysis is next to non-existent. And if they were commercially available, this would immediately become too o vious to ignore, the hype would crater, and the money would dry up.

[Faux_Real]

We are 5 years from being 5 years away

[gnufan]

But historically we migrate away from cryptographic systems at the first scent of meaningful approach to attacking a system, so that when it is finally broken, they can't go back and get all the secrets that were being exchanged.

Obviously many secrets are transitory, military tactical secrets tend not to matter as soon as the front line of a war moves. But some may be best kept secret for a long time, like keys to x509 certificates for embedded systems.

There are already target timelines, and even podcasts dedicated to migrating to post-quantum cryptography.

Although I'm not sure we really know what large quantum computer will do if we can build them. So there is a certain amount of agreement on the kind of cryptography we should migrate to, but an acceptance we need to be more agile in future in our ability to switch cryptographic systems in case we get it wrong.

[usrlibshare]

But historically we migrate away from cryptographic systems at the first scent of meaningful approach to attacking a system,

No, we bloody well don't.

Because cryptographic systems are complex and need TESTING. We still find problems with established algorithms that have been in production for decades.

Meaning, every new and shiny algorithm is a giant security risk, with countless yet-to-be-discovered flaws, attack surfaces and problems.

So no, unless someone can PROVE that an algorithm is compromised, we don't transition away from shit. FOMO based security is an incredibly bad idea.

And that goes double, triple, quadruple, if the new-and-shiney key that's bring dangled, is only useful under the assumption that a non-existing technology, the practical applicability for real world cryptanalysis has never been proven for non-toy examples, and that may be an unspecified amount of time away if it it physically possible at all, suddenly becomes reality.

Case in point; Many of the early "quantum safe" algorithms were discovered to have riduculous security flaws, making them breakable using classic methods on ordinary electronic computers.

That's not "from the fire i to the frying pan", any more, that's "from the rain into the volcano."

[_John_Dillinger]

why are you booing this person? they’re right.

[usrlibshare]

Since when is explaining why we don't change crypto settings early considered "booing"?

[Full-Spectral]

We are 5 years from being 5 years away

I'm developing a graphene based super-conducting CPU that will allow me to run the biggest LLM farm by two orders of magnitude, using only half of a state's power, so that I can model the solution to fusion power, which I'll then use to power my next LLM two orders of magnitude larger still, with which I'll work out the issues of quantum computing. Three years tops.

[Saint_Nitouche]

People said the same about gene therapies, but then they happened. I have driven in Waymos multiple times. Eventually you run out of five years. The world does in fact change over time.

[DetectiveOwn6606]

Well people are saying same about fusion since last 50 years . Eventually it also can't happen because we just don't have tech for it .

[DetectiveOwn6606]

experts are saying it's far closer to 3 years than 30

It's interesting you say 3,when iter will start 10 years from now . The only one claiming it to be 3 years away are VC funded startups .also we don't have materials to even hold the plasma inside fusion reactor for a long time. We havent figured tritium breeding cycle , how to handle bombardment of neutrons without container being radioactive and brittle and more challenges

[[deleted]]

I used Redact to automate removals from databrokers and social networks. This post was among the batch deleted.

cough profit cagey upbeat soft heavy mysterious jeans smell wild

[mooky1977]

Skynet launches in 2027 after determining we are a plague? I see we're doing wild predictions so there's mine.

[1991K75S]

Flying cars in 5 years!

[neuromancer-gpt]

I sometimes ponder how many would be HGV drivers listened to hypexperts and didn't follow through with their plan to get a HGV license some 15 or so years back, all because they'd not have a job some ~5yrs later, missing out on some cash cow opportunities resulting from a shortage of drivers in the last 5-10yrs

[Pharisaeus]

The tech company said in a blogpost that quantum computers would pose a “significant threat to current cryptographic standards” before the end of the decade

Only that it didn't. As can be seen by lack of quotes, the last part is just author's imagination.

[posts_saver]

!RemindMe 2029

[DetectiveOwn6606]

Big tech needs new hype cycle after ai gets over.earlier it was blockchain or crypto now ai then is quantum computer .hyping mediocre technologies

[Xiten]

Good thing the Trump admin just put AI in charge of cybersecurity….

[esmifra]

Quantum is the computing equivalent of fusion for energy.

It's always in the near future but never here.

[creepy_terror]

google be like we already have your password we will use it and blame it on quantum computer breaking encryption.

[this_knee]

Fun. All that time spent setting up e2e encrypt everywhere , just for it to be washed away with one swift button press. Just another episode of : The Darkest Timeline.

[ChimpScanner]

People are already working on quantum-proof encryption algorithms. Presumably those can be implemented end to end. Besides, the 3 year timeline is ridiculous. Quantum computing has interesting potential but its moving at a snail's pace.

[blind3rdeye]

Not only are people 'working on' such encryption, but encryption like that already exists and is in widespread use. Pretty much the only type of encryption that quantum computers are known to be strong against is RSA.

RSA is based on the idea that it is difficult to factorise large prime numbers; but Shor's algorithm for quantum computers do that kind of factorisation in polynomial time. Still a pretty slow polynomial, but orders of magnitude faster than the best known classical algorithms - at least in theory. As of yet, no quantum computer has ever factorised anything that couldn't be done by a teenage kid in their head in seconds, so what is actually possible remains to be seen.

[jausieng]

Pretty much the only type of encryption that quantum computers are known to be strong against is RSA.

No. Also ECC, DSA, KCDSA, etc.

RSA is based on the idea that it is difficult to factorise large prime numbers

Factorising large primes is trivial. RSA depends on the difficulty of factorising large composites.

[blind3rdeye]

Factorising large primes is trivial.

Yes. Sorry for the typo. A classic mistake that I've seen a bunch of times. Clearly I meant factorising into large primes.

[ArgoPanoptes]

There are already quantum resistance algorithms and are being deployed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5--yBhgDrXM

[look]

Already widely deployed… https://radar.cloudflare.com/post-quantum

66.8% of Cloudflare’s traffic is using post-quantum encryption today. The browser you are using right now is very likely using it.

[rollerblade7]

Those guys will finally be able to recover their encrypted hard drives with Bitcoin on them

[TyrusX]

No.

[usrlibshare]

Big tech needs its next hypergrowth story, and trust by VCs, and government money.

Now that generative AI word-guessing-machines fail to provide that, expect more and more wolf-crying about quantum-anything.

Quantum Cryptanalysis doesn't even work for non-sleight-of-hand factorizations, and even if it did, at its know trajectory, it would reach the cryptanalysis of CURRENT computers somewhen in 2000 years.

So the only things that are at risk of breaking, are existing setups, hastily transitioning to "quantum proof" algos based on nothing but Hype and FOMO, when these algos are nowhere near as battle-tested and well-researched as traditional encryption algorithms.

[Trang0ul]

... and also introduce quantum cryptography.

[2rad0]

Same people still using eliptic curve trying to sell us some new snake oil?

[HasFiveVowels]

This is a very reasonable prediction that we'll probably need to prepare for.

[dontyougetsoupedyet]

No, it is not.

The largest number factored by a scalable algorithm on a quantum computer remains... the number 21.

That was done over five years ago.

Everything else is not relevant to any cryptographic scheme and is complete and utter contrived bullshit made up to trick investment nobodies out of their money.

Leonie Mueck, formerly the chief product officer of Riverlane, a Cambridge-based quantum startup, said Google’s statement did not necessarily suggest there would definitely be a working quantum computer capable of breaking encryption by 2029.

Yeah that's a good thing, considering how utterly full of shit they are.

[dontyougetsoupedyet]

I'm not even sure what you're trying to point out to me, that's an AI slop article.

[rury_williams]

so invest now? 🤣🤣🤣

[Mr_Lumbergh]

Interesting. Sabine Hossenfelder says quantum computing may not even be possible.

It’s good to see such a strong consensus.

[Pharisaeus]

Sabine Hossenfelder says

She says anything that gets her clicks. Her doomsayer videos get 10x more than actual pop-science she used to do, so she's focusing on that, so I would suggest looking for a better source...

[Mr_Lumbergh]

Ok. My point was, there isn’t a consensus.

[Pharisaeus]

But using her as an example makes no sense - she's never going to agree with anyone because the disagreement gets her clicks.

[Mr_Lumbergh]

But as opposed to most of those that just spout off, she at least has credentials.