quantum

According to The Defiant, Ethereum researchers Thomas Coratger, Justin Drake, and others released a proposal on June 1 at the Ethereum research forum, planning to establish a dedicated XMSS public key registry as the first concrete protocol upgrade for Ethereum's migration to post-quantum cryptography.This registry allows approximately 1 million validators to pre-register quantum-safe XMSS keys before the full switch to the BLS signature system, serving as an important "preheating phase" to reduce the impact of the subsequent switch on network stability. This proposal has been included in the Ethereum Foundation's protocol team's Strawmap roadmap, marking the first protocol fork on that roadmap.

The Huobi HTX VIP private class "AI + Trading from Theory to Practice" was held in Shanghai, where early Bitcoin miner and pyra.io CTO Tian Jia shared the development of quantum computing and the impact of AI on trading.He believes that the average time it takes to threaten "Bitcoin addresses with exposed public keys" is 7 to 8 years, with a range of 5 to 15 years. The required number of logical qubits is between 1200 and 2400, while the number of physical qubits is less than 500,000. Additionally, Bitcoin also has defensive measures; it can migrate to PQC, or post-quantum cryptography, although there are significant challenges, such as the locking issue of Satoshi's coin.

Circle released a quantum security white paper, proposing a phased upgrade plan covering Arc, USDC, smart contracts, and the validator system to address potential security risks posed by future quantum computing.

ZeroTier CEO Andrew Gault stated that the potential threat of quantum computing to the Bitcoin industry may not be limited to the security of wallet private keys; encrypted communication and authentication data between institutions also face long-term risks.

Circle released the "Post-Quantum Security White Paper," proposing a phased post-quantum resilience roadmap focused on the long-term security of the Arc blockchain ecosystem.The roadmap covers multiple technical directions, including quantum secure signatures, private execution environments, validator hardening, infrastructure migration, and account recovery, applicable to core components such as the Arc network, USDC, smart contracts, and validators.Circle stated that it plans to provide post-quantum signature support when the Arc mainnet launches (in 2026) to enhance the ecosystem's ability to respond to future quantum computing threats.

According to a video shared by DEGEN NEWS, Nic Carter, a partner at Castle Island Ventures, stated that Solana needs a complete rebuild to defend against quantum attacks. He pointed out, "This will be tricky for Solana because they have highly optimized around a certain variant of elliptic curve and have also made targeted optimizations at the hardware level.The entire core idea of Solana is high throughput. Ultimately, they may adopt lattice-based cryptography, but the speed will slow down, and the throughput may decrease, which is precisely what Solana is all about."

According to Bloomberg, quantum computing company Quantinuum Inc. is seeking to raise $1.05 billion through its initial public offering (IPO) in the U.S., leveraging current investor enthusiasm for quantum computing technology to drive the listing process.According to documents the company submitted to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Tuesday, Quantinuum plans to issue approximately 21 million shares at a price of $45 to $50 per share. Based on the upper limit of the issuance range and the number of shares disclosed in the documents, Quantinuum's market capitalization would reach approximately $12.7 billion. The company, supported by Honeywell International Inc., is one of the most closely watched firms in the current quantum computing field.

According to Aastocks, Hong Kong-listed company Guofu Quantum announced the acquisition of a total of 11.89 million issued shares of the decentralized social and messaging platform Luffa AI for $19.8 million (approximately HKD 154 million), and additionally invested $20 million (approximately HKD 156 million) to subscribe for a total of 10 million new shares of Luffa AI. After the transaction is completed, it will hold a 19.9% stake in Luffa AI.Luffa AI is primarily engaged in the development and operation of communication and social network products and related services based on artificial intelligence and Web3, using end-to-end encryption and distributed technology to protect user data, and providing decentralized identity, permission management, and other services as the infrastructure layer for autonomous artificial intelligence agents.

According to CoinDesk, several researchers in the fields of post-quantum cryptography and blockchain security have stated that AI is accelerating the development of quantum computing and forcing the encryption industry to reassess the reliability of existing security systems.Project Eleven CEO Alex Pruden pointed out that researchers are using machine learning to optimize quantum error correction—one of the biggest engineering bottlenecks in the field of quantum computing. NEAR Protocol co-founder and former Google AI researcher Illia Polosukhin warned that the "harvest now, decrypt later" strategy has become a real threat, where attackers collect encrypted traffic now and decrypt it later when quantum computers mature, "this is likely already happening."Since most blockchain networks rely on the same elliptic curve cryptography as the internet, once quantum computers become powerful enough, they could theoretically derive private keys from public keys, thereby compromising wallets and systems. Researchers noted that the combination of AI and quantum computing is creating a continuous arms race in security, where security measures will no longer be static infrastructure but must continuously evolve and upgrade. Currently, multiple blockchain ecosystems such as Ethereum, Solana, and NEAR are actively promoting post-quantum cryptography migration solutions.

According to Decrypt, research published by Glassnode shows that nearly one-third of circulating Bitcoin has exposed public keys, theoretically making it vulnerable to future quantum computer attacks. Specifically, about 6.04 million Bitcoins worth over $46.9 billion are at quantum risk. Among these, approximately 1.92 million are structurally exposed, originating from early "pay-to-public-key" addresses, multi-signature structures, and Taproot outputs, which are script formats that default to exposing public keys.About 4.12 million are operationally exposed, stemming from address reuse behavior. Among the Bitcoins with operational exposure, approximately 1.66 million are related to exchanges, accounting for 8.3% of the total supply and about 40% of all operationally exposed Bitcoins. From the holdings of major exchanges, only 5% of Coinbase's Bitcoins are exposed to quantum risk, while Binance and Bitfinex have exposure rates of 85% and 100%, respectively. Glassnode states that this result should not be interpreted as a risk ranking of specific companies or a signal of solvency.

According to The Wall Street Journal, the U.S. Department of Commerce announced a total of $2 billion in government subsidies to nine quantum computing companies, including IBM, and will acquire equity in the related transactions. This move aims to accelerate the cultivation of the emerging quantum computing industry and promote the development of more stable and scalable quantum computing systems. The report states that this round of funding is part of the Trump administration's plan to maintain the U.S. competitive advantage in the field of frontier computing and to initiate a "new era of technological innovation."

On May 14, BNB Chain released the "BSC Post-Quantum Cryptography Migration Report," stating that it has completed the migration testing for quantum-resistant cryptography for transaction signatures and the consensus layer, using the NIST standardized post-quantum signature algorithm ML-DSA-44 (Dilithium) and the pqSTARK aggregation scheme.The report shows that BSC has replaced transaction signatures from ECDSA to ML-DSA-44 and switched consensus voting aggregation from BLS12-381 to pqSTARK to address the potential threats posed by future quantum computing to the existing elliptic curve cryptography system. However, post-quantum signatures also significantly increase the on-chain data volume: the size of a single transaction has increased from about 110 bytes to approximately 2.5KB; the block size in a 2000 TPS scenario has increased from about 130KB to around 2MB; and the TPS in the testing environment has decreased by about 40%-50%.BSC stated that the current network bottleneck mainly comes from the larger transaction data propagation, rather than the consensus protocol itself. Meanwhile, the consensus layer aggregation still maintains high efficiency, with pqSTARK achieving a signature compression ratio of about 43:1, and the additional burden on validators remains within a controllable range. The report concludes that existing technology can achieve "quantum-resistant" deployment for blockchain, but future issues related to network bandwidth and data scalability still need to be addressed.

According to CoinDesk, Citibank stated in its latest report that the progress of quantum computing technology is faster than the market expected, accelerating the potential security risks faced by cryptocurrencies and internet infrastructure, with Bitcoin being considered one of the assets with the "greatest risk exposure." The report points out that the ECDSA elliptic curve cryptography system currently used by Bitcoin could theoretically be cracked by sufficiently powerful quantum computers. In the future, attackers may be able to derive private keys from publicly disclosed public keys, allowing them to forge transactions and steal assets.Citibank analyst Alex Saunders stated that due to its relatively conservative governance mechanism and slow protocol upgrade speed, Bitcoin is more difficult to quickly complete quantum-resistant upgrades compared to PoS networks like Ethereum. The report estimates that there are currently about 6.5 million to 6.9 million BTC at potential quantum risk due to exposed public keys, accounting for about one-third of the current circulating supply, valued at approximately $450 billion at current prices. This includes some early P2PK addresses and wallets believed to belong to Satoshi Nakamoto.Citibank also warns of the "Harvest Now, Decrypt Later" risk, where attackers currently collect encrypted data and wait until future quantum computing power matures to decrypt it all at once.However, Citibank remains optimistic about the long-term adaptability of the cryptocurrency industry, believing that blockchain can still migrate through post-quantum cryptography and protocol reconstruction in the future. The report mentions that the BIP-360 and BIP-361 upgrade proposals currently being discussed by the Bitcoin community are worth paying attention to.

According to Decrypt, the cryptocurrency technology company Quantography Labs has announced the launch of the early access version of the cryptocurrency wallet Lock.com. This product uses "Isolated Signing" and an Air-Gapped architecture, enabling offline private key management without the need for dedicated hardware wallet devices.The official statement indicates that Lock.com separates the signing environment from the network broadcasting environment: private keys are always stored in a completely offline device, while transactions are created and broadcast on a connected device, thus avoiding private key exposure to the internet. The platform emphasizes that users can directly use existing devices without relying on third-party hardware manufacturers or supply chains. Additionally, Lock.com integrates post-quantum cryptography architecture, including ML-DSA digital signatures and ML-KEM key encapsulation mechanisms, to enhance security in future quantum computing environments.Quantography Labs stated that the current early access phase is mainly used to collect user feedback and prepare for a subsequent full launch.

According to Cointelegraph, Tezos ecosystem developers have launched a prototype of a private blockchain payment testnet called TzEL, aimed at resisting future quantum computing attacks.This prototype uses post-quantum cryptography and zk-STARK proofs to protect transaction data and encrypted payment metadata, preventing "collect then decrypt" type attacks. TzEL leverages Tezos's data availability layer to handle the larger proof sizes brought by post-quantum cryptography (approximately 300 KB), which has been one of the main technical obstacles to building scalable quantum-resistant privacy systems on-chain. TzEL is currently running on the Tezos testnet and is still in the development stage, with the transition of the Tezos ecosystem to quantum-resistant cryptography still in its early stages.

At the Consensus 2026 Miami conference, Zcash Open Development Lab CEO Josh Swihart announced that Zcash will launch a quantum recoverable wallet within a month and fully achieve post-quantum status within 12 to 18 months.Additionally, the independent scaling solution aims to achieve Mastercard/Visa-level throughput within a similar timeframe. On the user side, the Electric Coin Company's wallet has enabled cross-chain swaps from assets like BTC, SOL, and USDC to privacy ZEC through the integration of Near Intents, with approximately $600-700 million in funds flowing through this route since its launch. The Near ecosystem's 30-day processing volume is close to $800 million, with Ethereum, Solana, and Zcash being the main chains.Furthermore, the project community is discussing reducing the Zcash block time from 75 seconds to 25 seconds, and the cross-chain bridge with Solana and Hyperliquid has gone live. A voting feature for token holders will also be launched, serving as an opinion layer for the project's existing consensus model. Currently, Zcash's shielded pool accounts for 30% of the circulating supply, reaching an all-time high. Analysts believe that if this ratio continues to grow with rising prices, this round of increase will be driven by real adoption rather than mere speculation.

NEAR Protocol stated on platform X that the team is adding post-quantum cryptography support for the network. NEAR's account model is different from Bitcoin and Ethereum; accounts are decoupled from cryptography and controlled through rotatable access keys.The NEAR One team is adding the NIST-approved lattice-based signature FIPS-204 scheme as the first post-quantum signature option. Once launched, any NEAR account holder can rotate keys through a single transaction, achieving quantum safety. NEAR is also collaborating with software and hardware wallets to advance post-quantum support.Through the chain signature feature, NEAR can provide threshold signatures for over 35 chains. The NEAR Intents team is developing a quantum-safe cross-chain signature solution. If other chains progress slowly in adopting post-quantum cryptography, NEAR can offer a quantum-safe environment. Aspects such as consensus mechanisms, validators, block synchronization, and transaction signatures also need to evolve for the post-quantum era, with the goal of achieving a one-time future-compatible migration.

According to The Block, the crypto anti-quantum computing solution Project Eleven released a report warning that the critical point for quantum computers to crack modern encryption, known as "Q-Day," could arrive as early as 2030, with a probability of over 50% by 2033. The report predicts that advancements in quantum computing will be explosive rather than linear, and the combined effects of hardware and algorithms could lead to a leap in capabilities that is "either completely silent or suddenly explosive."Last month, researchers used quantum hardware to derive a 15-digit elliptic curve key. Although this is still far from cracking the 256-bit encryption used by Bitcoin, it constitutes a preliminary validation. Project Eleven estimates that approximately 6.9 million Bitcoins may face quantum risks under specific conditions.

According to The Block, quantum security startup Project Eleven released a report stating that the "Q-Day," when quantum computers could break modern encryption technology, may arrive as early as 2030, with a probability of occurring before 2033 "likely exceeding 50%." The report warns that the enhancement of quantum computing capabilities will not be a linear progression but rather a leap "from nothing to something, triggered at once." Currently, approximately 6.9 million BTC (worth over $56 billion) are at risk of quantum attacks under certain conditions.In response to the aforementioned threat, several solutions have emerged in the industry: Paradigm researcher Dan Robinson proposed using timestamp proofs to help holders recover assets on future quantum-safe versions of the Bitcoin network; the BIP-361 proposal by Jameson Lopp and others suggests establishing a multi-year migration window to guide users in transferring funds to quantum-resistant addresses. Google has also advanced its quantum-resistant encryption migration target to 2029.