Bitcoin's quantum plan assumes some algorithms break. AI just weakened one in 60 hours
Researchers used AI to significantly speed up the process of breaking cryptographic algorithms, raising concerns about the future of digital security. While current Bitcoin protocols remain secure, the research highlights the urgent need for quantum-resistant encryption standards.
Why it matters
As AI accelerates the ability to crack existing encryption, the security of global financial and digital infrastructure faces new, evolving threats.
The work took about 60 hours and roughly $100,000 in computing costs, against an algorithm that had survived two years and two rounds of expert human review.
Digital signature schemes such as HAWK prove that a message or data set came from whoever holds a particular digital key that points to that exact message. Bitcoin uses one every time a coin moves, and so does every website showing a padlock in the browser.
The versions in use today are expected to fail to quantum computers, and HAWK is one of the candidates under review to replace them. It has not been publicly deployed anywhere.
Nothing in the research affects bitcoin or ether currently, as both secure transactions with elliptic curve signatures, which neither attack had targeted. HAWK is not one of the schemes bitcoin would migrate to.
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