4 ms·

Quantum resistant cryptography seems like the ideal choice for cryptocurrencies, interesting that only a handful have implemented this.

Retr0id 3y ago
Why cryptocurrencies specifically? Most cryptocurrencies value compact signatures, and so run into many of the same issues facing PKI.
- Thorrez 3y ago
  Without it the accounts are sitting ducks. Big fat juicy ducks just waiting to be poached.
  - Underpass9041 3y ago
    In Bitcoin public keys are hashed when publicly exposed, in the optimal case the ECDSA public keys are visible for only a period of a few minutes between broadcast of a transaction, and it being confirmed. It is not an incompatible change to add new signature methods, a conservative implementation would have the public key commit to both an ecdsa key, and a quantum safe signature type, and use the committed ECDSA signature until such a time as it is no longer safe. This would result in no gain in signature size today, but allows for instant upgrades in place in the future with no additional transactions required.
    - adastra22 3y ago
      Not anymore. Taproot keys are public.
    - Retr0id 3y ago
      You can recover a bitcoin public key from a valid signature.
  - idontwantthis 3y ago
    But couldn’t it be stolen just as easily from the thief?
px43 3y ago
I actually talked about this with Gavin (who was running the project back then) in 2013. It wasn't a priority, and it almost certainly never will be. Vitalik, on the other hand, has always made quantum resistance a priority, and the account abstraction model and pluggable signature schemes are just now starting to take off. Basically, you can deploy a smart contract to hold your assets, and part of the smart contract is that to move assets from the contract, you need to sign a message with something other than the typical ecdsa signatures. There are some wallets today that you can even send funds with passkey signatures, which will use the keys sitting in hardware on modern phones.
- jmprspret 3y ago
  Am I just supposed to know who fucking "Gavin" and "Vitalik" are?
  - grayhatter 3y ago
    you? probably no. I'm pretty confident that comment was only for the other crypto bros.
- Vecr 3y ago
  I can't remember Gavin's name, but Vitalik is Vitalik Buterin.
- ramchip 3y ago
  For others like me wondering what "the project" is, I think it's Ethereum. > Vitaly Dmitrievich Buterin, better known as Vitalik Buterin is a Canadian computer programmer and co-founder of Ethereum. > Gavin James Wood is an English computer scientist, a co-founder of Ethereum and creator of Polkadot and Kusama.
j16sdiz 3y ago
Indeed. Every new technological threat is a opportunity for scams.

Retr0id 3y ago

Why cryptocurrencies specifically? Most cryptocurrencies value compact signatures, and so run into many of the same issues facing PKI.

Thorrez 3y ago
Without it the accounts are sitting ducks. Big fat juicy ducks just waiting to be poached.
- Underpass9041 3y ago
  In Bitcoin public keys are hashed when publicly exposed, in the optimal case the ECDSA public keys are visible for only a period of a few minutes between broadcast of a transaction, and it being confirmed. It is not an incompatible change to add new signature methods, a conservative implementation would have the public key commit to both an ecdsa key, and a quantum safe signature type, and use the committed ECDSA signature until such a time as it is no longer safe. This would result in no gain in signature size today, but allows for instant upgrades in place in the future with no additional transactions required.
  - adastra22 3y ago
    Not anymore. Taproot keys are public.
  - Retr0id 3y ago
    You can recover a bitcoin public key from a valid signature.
- idontwantthis 3y ago
  But couldn’t it be stolen just as easily from the thief?

px43 3y ago

I actually talked about this with Gavin (who was running the project back then) in 2013. It wasn't a priority, and it almost certainly never will be. Vitalik, on the other hand, has always made quantum resistance a priority, and the account abstraction model and pluggable signature schemes are just now starting to take off. Basically, you can deploy a smart contract to hold your assets, and part of the smart contract is that to move assets from the contract, you need to sign a message with something other than the typical ecdsa signatures. There are some wallets today that you can even send funds with passkey signatures, which will use the keys sitting in hardware on modern phones.

jmprspret 3y ago
Am I just supposed to know who fucking "Gavin" and "Vitalik" are?
- grayhatter 3y ago
  you? probably no. I'm pretty confident that comment was only for the other crypto bros.
Vecr 3y ago
I can't remember Gavin's name, but Vitalik is Vitalik Buterin.
ramchip 3y ago
For others like me wondering what "the project" is, I think it's Ethereum. > Vitaly Dmitrievich Buterin, better known as Vitalik Buterin is a Canadian computer programmer and co-founder of Ethereum. > Gavin James Wood is an English computer scientist, a co-founder of Ethereum and creator of Polkadot and Kusama.

j16sdiz 3y ago

Indeed. Every new technological threat is a opportunity for scams.