Bitcoin Quantum Fears Date Back to 2011

BitMEX Research has shared a retrospective analysis of the long-standing debate regarding quantum computing and its potential threat to Bitcoin.

It contrasts discussions from the early days of Bitcoin (circa 2010) with the present day. 

Interestingly enough, BitMEX Research claims that the arguments happening today are nearly identical to those from 15 years ago.

In the early days, some warned that the US government could break Bitcoin’s encryption (ECDSA) within 5 years. They urged an immediate switch to “post-quantum” algorithms.

It has shared a threat from the BitcoinTalk forum that represents an early debate regarding the existential threat that quantum computing (QC) poses to Bitcoin. The discussion ranges from alarmist predictions of Bitcoin’s death to skepticism regarding the feasibility of quantum technology.

The thread begins with the premise that Quantum Computing acts as a “massive hammer” that could shatter current cryptographic algorithms, rendering Bitcoin useless. 

Several users (Kiba, Grondilu) argued that if QC becomes powerful enough to crack Bitcoin, it will also crack SSL, banking systems, and military secrets.

A significant portion of the forum dismissed the threat as “science fiction” or “vaporware.” One user noted that the most impressive feat of QC at the time was factoring the number 15, arguing that scaling this to break encryption was decades away. Users also called into question the legitimacy of D-Wave. 

The benefit of waiting

If Bitcoin had panicked and switched to quantum-resistant encryption 10 or 15 years ago, it would have been a mistake, BitMEX Research argues.

Early post-quantum cryptographic signatures were massive in terms of data size (often kilobytes in size).

Implementing these early solutions would have “bloated” the blockchain, making transactions significantly larger, more expensive, and slower to process.

By waiting, Bitcoin developers can now look at much more efficient technologies. 

A 350-byte signature is a major breakthrough. It is small enough to be practical for Bitcoin’s block size limits.

For context, standard Bitcoin signatures (ECDSA/Schnorr) are very small (~64 bytes). Early quantum-resistant schemes were thousands of bytes.