Analysis: AI will accelerate the threat of quantum computing, and the crypto industry may be entering an era of continuous security arms race.

According to Odaily Odaily, several blockchain and post-quantum cryptography researchers have warned that artificial intelligence (AI) is accelerating the development of quantum computing and may impact the security systems of mainstream blockchains, including Bitcoin and Ethereum, ahead of schedule. Alex Pruden, CEO of Project Eleven, which focuses on quantum-resistant infrastructure, said that the combination of AI and quantum computing is fundamentally changing the future security landscape, and "people will no longer be able to rely on existing security assumptions as they have in the past." Researchers point out that AI has been used to optimize quantum error correction, which is one of the key technological bottlenecks in the development of quantum computing. Illia Polosukhin also stated that AI has been accelerating scientific breakthroughs for many years, and in the future, there may even be a cyclical acceleration effect where "AI helps build the next generation of quantum computers." One of the biggest concerns in the industry right now is the "Harvest Now, Decrypt Later" strategy, where governments or sophisticated attackers begin collecting encrypted data on a massive scale now, waiting for quantum computing to mature and then decrypt it all at once. Polosukhin warned that if quantum computers mature within a few years, "most of the important data on the internet today could be decrypted in the future." Since most current blockchain networks and internet infrastructure widely employ elliptic curve cryptography (ECC), theoretically, a sufficiently powerful quantum computer could deduce the private key from the public key, thereby directly compromising wallets and on-chain systems. Meanwhile, AI itself is also enhancing hacking capabilities. Pruden stated that AI models are becoming increasingly adept at discovering software vulnerabilities, cryptographic implementation flaws, and may even directly crack some encryption algorithms in the future. However, AI is also being used by developers for code auditing, formal verification, and testing of post-quantum secure systems, creating a "long-term security arms race" where both offense and defense are simultaneously upgraded. Researchers believe that the biggest change brought about by AI and quantum computing is that the core assumption of "long-term reliable encryption" in the digital age is being shaken, and future security systems may shift from "static upgrades" to continuous dynamic evolution. (CoinDesk)