What Is The Quantum Meltdown Of Encryption?

Why Go For Quantum Computing?

One of the greatest breakthroughs in information technology is quantum computing that is growing by leaps in all fields of computer science from data analysis to machine learning. Like all those technological achievements, from the combustion engine to nuclear power, harnessing quantum comes with potential dangers as well. In the very infrastructure keeping digital sphere safe, quantum computers have created a slew of unforeseen vulnerabilities.

Behind nearly all encryption ciphers used today is the underlying assumption that their complexity precludes any attempt by hackers to break them when it would take years for even the most advanced conventional computers to do so. It is now the turn of quantum computing to change all of that.

With the promise to bring computational power leaps and bounds ahead of most advanced machines, quantum computers are the result of all of the hard work. As scientists at Google begins testing their cutting edge 7 2 qubit quantum computer, they are expected to demonstrate quantum supremacy or the ability to perform calculation previously impossible with traditional computers.

The Chink In The Armor

In today’s standard encryption techniques, they are based on what’s called Public Key Infrastructure or PKI, which is a set of protocols the information technology world brought forward in the 1970s. By generating a complex cipher through random numbers, PKI is the only intended recipient of a given message the one in possession of the private key, it can decode.

PKI was sound and reliable as a system o encoding data. There is still one question needed to be answered to implement it as a method to be used in the real world, that is how could individuals ascertain the identity of the person reaching out and making the request to communicate with us? In what’s known as a Man-in-the-Middle attack, this vulnerability lets the door open for cybercriminals to impersonate legitimate servers and in the worst-case scenario, insert themselves into a conversation between users and intercept communications between them.

Digital certificates as electronic documents the content of which can prove senders are actually who they claim to be is a solution to this authentication problem. To know the parties who it is they are about to communicate, it is important to submit certificates at the initiation of a session. Everyone from private users to the biggest names in tech relies upon trusted third party companies called Certificate Authorities or CAs, creating and providing these documents.

These certificates rely on public-key cryptographic functions, for their reliability that is not too distant future will be vulnerable to attack by quantum machines. These altered certificates are used by cybercriminals in faking the identity, completely undermining certificates as a method of authentication.

Decentralizing The Threat

When it comes to encryption, this isn’t the first time we’ve had to get creative. Revealing his revolutionary idea in a 2008 white paper, the Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto, introduced a unique peer-to-peer authentication system that we call blockchain today. Without needing third party authentication, the brilliantly innovative blockchain system at the core is an open ledger recording transaction between two parties in a permanent way. With keeping Nakamoto’s digital currency safe from fraudsters, the blockchain provided a global record-keeping network. Based on the concept of decentralization, blockchain spreads the authentication process across the large body of users. Without the collusion of the majority of the entire network, no single piece of data can be altered without the alteration of all other blocks.

Blockchain and Bitcoin remain the same for years. Recently the innovators in the industry discovered that blockchain could be used for more than just securing cryptocurrency. With producing programs to be applied in a wide range of industries from healthcare to insurance, to political elections, the original system designed for Bitcoin can be altered. These new platforms added to the picture the ability to record new types o data in addition to the currency exchanges such as loans and contractual agreements.

As the advantages of blockchain became apparent, nearly fifteen percent of financial institutions in the world use blockchain to secure aspects of operations. This led to the number of industries incorporating decentralized systems continuing to grow. 

Saving PKI

Integrating decentralization into Public Key Infrastructure is the best solution for protecting encryption from the ever-growing processing power.

This means that instead of keeping digital certificates in one centralized location, making them vulnerable to being hacked, and tampered with, it spreads out in a worldwide ledger one that fundamentally impervious to alteration. It discourages hackers from attempting to modify certificates unable to pull off such a fraud, meaning it has to change data stored on enumerable diversified blocks spread out across the cybersphere.  

The Final Thoughts On Quantum Computing

Already been proven as a highly effective way of protecting recorded data from tampering, decentralization has made the system robust. Using a blockchain type system, it replaces the single entity, Certificate Authority keeping digital certificates much safer. To keep the quantum computing revolution from undermining the foundation of PKI, it is the only foreseeable solution.