Why Quantum Computers Will Never Break Bitcoin – Palm Beach Research Group

In 1940, one genius completed a puzzle in just 20 minutes that shouldve taken him a million years to solve.

His name is Alan Turing.

You may be familiar with Turings story from the 2014 movie The Imitation Game. Benedict Cumberbatch earned a Best Actor nomination for his portrayal of the genius.

If you saw the movie, you know Turing is considered the father of computer science and one of the most important code-breakers of all time.

When World War II broke out in 1939, Turing was assigned to breaking encrypted messages from the Germans.

This was no easy task, as the Germans held the most sophisticated encryption machine at the time, the Enigma.

Credit: ironypoisoning, via Wikimedia Commons

The Enigmas encryption was far greater than anything before its time.

It became clear cracking the code to the Enigma was going to require an even smarter machine. So Turing built one.

It took Turing and his team nearly a year to build a machine that was powerful enough to decrypt Enigmas messages. It was known as the Bombe, and it helped the Allies crack 84,000 Enigma-coded messages each month.

Decrypting messages went from taking potentially a million years by hand to just 20 minutes.

Heres why were telling you this

Last year, IBM debuted its 1,121-qubit Condor processor. Its the most advanced quantum computer to date.

Quantum computers such as the Condor can perform billions of calculations per second. So they can find patterns in data that are invisible to classic computers. They have the potential to revolutionize everything from medicine to engineering.

Many crypto skeptics believe bitcoins defenses will be broken as quantum computers get more powerful And it will share the same fate as the Enigma.

But theres one key mistake that made the Enigma almost certain to fail. And bitcoin doesnt share that flaw

The reason Enigma failed is because once it was built its creators never improved it.

It was only a matter of time before those looking to crack the Enigma would develop better technology.

While the Enigma stood dead in its tracks, Turing made improvements to his decryption machine every day until it became more powerful than the Enigma.

The lesson here is that you always need to push forward. If you dont, the competition will close the gap.

Its a lesson bitcoin developers took to heart.

The bitcoin network was developed with quantum computing mechanics in mind. To combat this, the difficulty to mine the next bitcoin block increases as more computing power comes online.

Take a look at the chart below. It shows the hash power, or computing power, of the bitcoin mining network.

Every year, the computing power that goes into mining a bitcoin block (in other words, processing a transaction) increases.

As mentioned above, IBM released its 1,121-qubit Condor processor in December 2023.

According to the University of Sussex, youd need a quantum computer with 1.9 billion qubits of processing power to break the bitcoin network.

This means youd need 1.7 million of the most powerful quantum computers built today.

IBM believes it can get to 10,000 qubits by 2026. Even then, itll need nearly 200,000 of these machines to crack the bitcoin network.

How long will it take for companies like IBM to build this many machines? Years? Decades?

Plus, if you want to attack the bitcoin network, you need to control 51% of the networks computing power.

Today, one of the best bitcoin miners, the Bitmain Antminer S19 Pro, will cost you $2,200. This machine can generate 110 terahashes per second (TH/s).

The bitcoin network uses roughly 384.33 million TH/s. That means youd need 1.78 million Antminer S19 Pros to overtake the network. Thats over $3.9 billion.

Youd also need to pay for a storage facility to set up these machines. And youd need to coordinate a massive amount of electricity to the building. These machines consume roughly 3,250 watts per hour.

At an average cost of 23 cents per kilowatt, that would cost about $32 million per day.

But even if you spend nearly $4 billion to take over the bitcoin network, youd never be able to extract all $500 billion of its value. The moment that you overtake the network, its value would race to zero.

Its like pirates buying a $4 billion battleship to commandeer a cargo ship carrying $400 million worth of goods. Its not worth the effort.

And thats why the bitcoin network is considered antifragile. It would cost you more to take over the network than the network would be worth.

Every year that bitcoin exists, it moves further and further out of reach of attackers.

So while you might need 1.9 billion qubits of quantum computing processing power to break the blockchain today Youll likely need 3 billion qubits of processing power next year. And 4 billion the following year and so on.

Thats what separates the fatal flaw of the Enigma from the security of the bitcoin network.

When technology like the Enigma just stands still, competition surpasses you.

Bitcoin, on the other hand, is constantly improving its security. Its never satisfied with where its at. Even if it appears to be unbreakable today, it will still be stronger tomorrow.

So when you see quantum computers gaining ground, know that bitcoin isnt standing still.

Thats why the advances of quantum computers arent a threat to bitcoin for the foreseeable future.

So dont let quantum computing fears stop you from owning a stake in one of the worlds greatest assets.

Palm Beach Research Group

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Why Quantum Computers Will Never Break Bitcoin - Palm Beach Research Group