Bitcoin’s quantum problem gets a recovery tool, but not for Satoshi’s 1.1 million coins
Project Eleven has developed a zero-knowledge proof tool designed to protect Bitcoin holdings from potential future quantum computing threats. This technology aims to provide a recovery path for assets that might otherwise be compromised by Shor's algorithm.
Why it matters
As quantum computing advances, the cryptographic foundations of digital assets like Bitcoin face existential risks; this tool represents a proactive security measure for the ecosystem.
BIP-361 , published in April by Jameson Lopp and five co-authors, would block new deposits to vulnerable addresses after three years and freeze whatever remained after five, stranding coins in more than a third of bitcoin's supply, including the roughly 1.1 million BTC attributed to pseudonymous creator Satoshi Nakamoto.
A later step of that plan promised a recovery path using zero-knowledge proofs, a technology that lets someone prove to another person that they know a fact without ever revealing it.
Quantum research outfit Project Eleven says it has now built exactly that, and made it fast enough to use.
Q-Day is a theoretical point at which a quantum computer could derive a private key from a public key, allowing an attacker to sign transactions from any address whose public key has ever been exposed.
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