Encryption today is typically a game of very large numbers. Some of today’s cryptographic systems, like RSA or elliptic-curve cryptography, utilize as keys integers that are hundreds or thousands of bits long. Cracking a key requires breaking down one of these integers into its prime-number factors. Even the mightiest non-quantum computers struggle to perform this calculation in any reasonable timeframe.
That is why quantum hardware can completely rewrite the rules of encryption. Quantum computers have a potential weapon called Shor’s algorithm that can factorize colossal integers in a dramatically accelerated time.
Fortunately for some, quantum computers aren’t yet powerful enough to wield Shor’s algorithm on demand. There is still time to introduce alternative security methods like lattice cryptography that are invulnerable to this kind of quantum cracking. For example, the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) has laid out a plan to switch the country’s cloud services, network infrastructure, and more to lattice cryptography algorithms developed by the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST).
IEEE Spectrum spoke to Scott Best, a senior engineer at chip design company Rambus, on what needs to happen to transition cryptographic protocols to a world where quantum computers are now longer in the future.
To read more, click here.