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Given the history of past innovations in cryptography (public key), it's reasonable to assume that there are quantum machines in the works or already operating

by cm3 10y ago

Given the history of past innovations in cryptography (public key), it's reasonable to assume that there are quantum machines in the works or already operating (to some extent) behind closed doors inside institutions that benefit from having everyone believe such a capability doesn't exist yet. We don't know if someone has it, but I don't agree with Google's remark that there's no imminent threat. It's wise to assume it does and speed up R&D of production PQC. Even if it doesn't exist, there's enough data that can be recorded now and is still valuable to decrypt later, so it makes a lot of sense to implement and deploy PQC. Edit: To rephrase: even if we don't know of any capable system, it's wise to take precautions now. I'd compare it to a storm shelter. You don't unpack a blowup storm shelter once the weather report comes in. You prepare, assuming the worst. I'm not arguing that someone has such a system, but that we don't know and have been proven wrong before only after Whitman and Diffie combined the pieces and had to fight for publishing their results. NSA and BT came forward after their paper was published and wouldn't have otherwise.

johncolanduoni 10y ago
> it's reasonable to assume that there are quantum machines in the works or already operating (to some extent) behind closed doors inside institutions that benefit from having everyone believe such a capability doesn't exist yet. I would be very surprised. Somehow, the more clandestine parts of governments would have had to siphon off a whole ton of people working in quantum information (physicists, engineers, mathematicians), which is a relatively new and close-knit field, without anybody noticing. Or, people who work in collaboration with parts of the government (NIST and UMD's JQI) are all making up work that looks like they haven't cracked it yet, when they really did last year. If all the NSA needed were mathematicians and electrical engineers that specialized in classical computing, then I could believe they had something going on. As it stands, most people in QI seem to land in industry, academia, or perhaps some national laboratories, not report to Fort Meade or fall of the face of the Earth. This would be like doing the Manhattan project, but with the extra complication finding convincing body doubles for Feynman, Oppenheimer, etc.
- roblabla 10y ago
  There's a good point in GP's post though. The thing is, one day quantum computers WILL BE available to the NSA or whatever. And they also have the means to record all encrypted transmissions (and they probably do). So one day, the NSA will be able to crack those transmissions that are using pre-quantum algorithms. Using post-quantum algorithms ASAP would at least make sure that from this point on, we're "safe" from quantum computers making a sudden appearance tomorrow.
  - johncolanduoni 10y ago
    I don't contest that at all, I'm very much in the "let's have post-quantum redundancies here yesterday" camp. I just found it hard to believe (though I was quite entertained by the conjecture) that the people I know in QI are either NSA impostors or stupid enough to fall for NSA impostors of their colleagues.

by cm3 10y ago

johncolanduoni 10y ago

> it's reasonable to assume that there are quantum machines in the works or already operating (to some extent) behind closed doors inside institutions that benefit from having everyone believe such a capability doesn't exist yet. I would be very surprised. Somehow, the more clandestine parts of governments would have had to siphon off a whole ton of people working in quantum information (physicists, engineers, mathematicians), which is a relatively new and close-knit field, without anybody noticing. Or, people who work in collaboration with parts of the government (NIST and UMD's JQI) are all making up work that looks like they haven't cracked it yet, when they really did last year. If all the NSA needed were mathematicians and electrical engineers that specialized in classical computing, then I could believe they had something going on. As it stands, most people in QI seem to land in industry, academia, or perhaps some national laboratories, not report to Fort Meade or fall of the face of the Earth. This would be like doing the Manhattan project, but with the extra complication finding convincing body doubles for Feynman, Oppenheimer, etc.

roblabla 10y ago
There's a good point in GP's post though. The thing is, one day quantum computers WILL BE available to the NSA or whatever. And they also have the means to record all encrypted transmissions (and they probably do). So one day, the NSA will be able to crack those transmissions that are using pre-quantum algorithms. Using post-quantum algorithms ASAP would at least make sure that from this point on, we're "safe" from quantum computers making a sudden appearance tomorrow.
- johncolanduoni 10y ago
  I don't contest that at all, I'm very much in the "let's have post-quantum redundancies here yesterday" camp. I just found it hard to believe (though I was quite entertained by the conjecture) that the people I know in QI are either NSA impostors or stupid enough to fall for NSA impostors of their colleagues.