Two messages landed in my inbox not too long ago that requested about the identical problem from completely different angles.
Stan B. wrote: “I simply learn your article concerning the development of AI. Fascinating. However I’m much more serious about one other know-how that appears to be creating alongside AI. Quantum computing. What does the longer term appear like when these two applied sciences mature? Higher but, what does it appear like when they’re mixed?”
Then Jeff M. adopted with the darker model of the identical query: “Can’t assist however surprise if these brokers, within the unsuitable palms, can crack crypto safety, protection work, and so forth. If that’s the case, how will we stop this?”
Thanks, Stan and Jeff. Your emails jogged my memory that I needed to revisit a subject I took a deep dive into final yr…
Q-Day.
As a result of based mostly on what we’ve seen during the last seven months, I feel it might be coming so much quicker than most individuals anticipated.
We’re In Stage One
Q-Day is a time period for the second {that a} quantum laptop turns into highly effective sufficient to interrupt the public-key cryptography that protects bitcoin wallets, financial institution logins, army communications and an enormous chunk of the trendy web.
In July of final yr, I laid out why that “sometime” drawback can also be a “we’ve to begin making ready now” drawback. And I’m beginning to consider that the period of time we’ve to arrange is getting shorter.
Right here’s why.
When folks hear Q-Day, they consider a single dramatic occasion. Somebody flips a swap and the world’s encryption collapses in a single day.
At the least, that’s how it could play out in a film.
However that’s not how this risk is prone to play out in actual life. As a substitute, it’s certain to reach in phases.
And stage one is already right here.
I name the “harvest-now, decrypt-later” stage. You see, our adversaries are already intercepting encrypted site visitors at the moment. And so they’re storing it to attend for the day that they’ll unlock it with quantum know-how.
That’s why safety groups aren’t ready for a quantum breakthrough earlier than they act. They’re already specializing in probably the most susceptible piece of the system.
Once you go to a web site, your browser and that web site carry out a fast change on the very starting of the connection. Consider it as agreeing on a secret code earlier than a dialog begins. That brief change is what units up the encryption that protects every thing that follows.
If a strong quantum laptop can break that preliminary change, it might probably unlock the entire session.
So firms are upgrading that first step now.
Cloudflare, which sits in entrance of an enormous portion of the web’s site visitors, has already rolled out what’s referred to as “hybrid” encryption. In easy phrases, meaning it makes use of at the moment’s classical cryptography and new quantum-resistant math collectively. Even when one fails sooner or later, the opposite nonetheless protects the connection.
Cloudflare is already deploying this hybrid encryption throughout reside web site visitors at a world scale.
And that brings us to stage two: adoption.
As quantum-resistant encryption turns into the default setting in software program that folks already use, we’ll have an extra layer of safety towards the potential hurt of Q-Day.
That shift is occurring quicker than most individuals understand.
By early December 2025, Cloudflare mentioned the share of human-generated internet site visitors it sees that’s post-quantum encrypted reached 52%, up from 29% initially of 2025.
And it’s not simply browsers and internet servers. In September 2025, GitHub began upgrading the safety behind the scenes.
GitHub is the place a lot of the world’s software program is constructed. When software program builders hook up with GitHub to add or replace code, they use a safe channel.
GitHub has begun switching that channel to new, quantum-resistant encryption.
The identical shift is occurring in OpenSSH, one of the extensively used safety instruments on the web. New variations now default to quantum-resistant encryption, and future variations will actively warn customers in the event that they aren’t utilizing it.
So the web is already behaving just like the quantum risk is actual. And the instruments that construct and keep trendy software program are already altering the locks.
However is Q-Day actually simply across the nook? How shut are we to really highly effective, code-breaking quantum machines?
Not essentially.
The bottleneck continues to be reliability. Quantum bits, or qubits, are extraordinarily fragile. They lose their quantum state rapidly and make errors continually.
That’s why nobody is cracking bitcoin’s encryption at the moment. It’s not as a result of researchers don’t know the mathematics. It’s as a result of at the moment’s quantum machines can’t run lengthy, complicated calculations with out falling aside.
So the race to attain code-breaking quantum computer systems isn’t nearly including extra qubits.
It’s about fixing errors.
The breakthrough everyone seems to be chasing is one thing referred to as “fault tolerance.” Meaning constructing techniques that may detect and proper errors quick sufficient to maintain a computation secure.
And we are getting nearer to fixing this drawback.
In October 2025, IBM demonstrated a quantum error-correction system working in actual time on typical chips that monitor and stabilize qubits. IBM positioned this as a key step towards constructing a large-scale, fault-tolerant quantum laptop.
That’s excellent news for a bunch of industries that can profit as quantum machines turn into extra secure.
Nevertheless it additionally means the timeline to Q-Day simply received shorter.
Right here’s My Take
So the place does this go away Stan’s optimistic query and Jeff’s involved one?
The factor is, AI and quantum don’t have to merge into some sci-fi superweapon to create threat. AI already makes cyberattacks quicker and extra automated, whereas quantum computing threatens the mathematics that protects our knowledge.
But when AI brokers pace up assaults whereas quantum weakens encryption, the stakes rise actually quick.
So how will we stop this?
It comes right down to migration.
The U.S. requirements physique, NIST, has already finalized new quantum-resistant encryption requirements. In plain phrases, they’ve revealed the alternative locks. They’ve even chosen backup choices based mostly on completely different math, simply in case one strategy fails.
Now the job is to swap the locks earlier than somebody builds a greater lock-pick.
As a result of Q-Day isn’t a single date on a calendar. It’s a course of that’s already underway.
And given how briskly web infrastructure is adopting quantum-resistant encryption, and the way steadily {hardware} is bettering, I consider probably the most life like Q-Day timelines are shifting nearer, not farther away.
Which suggests the following 5 years are possible the window that issues most.
Regards,
Ian King
Chief Strategist, Banyan Hill Publishing
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