Google reveals new quantum chip, can it crack crypto encryption?

The Quantum AI team at Google has launched a new quantum computing chip, “Willow.” The chip has reportedly been scaled up with more qubits and has the ability to perform fast computations with exponentially reduced errors. While it’s a big leap in quantum computing, it may raise concerns about Willow being a potential threat to crypto encryption.

Willow is powered to find solutions to computational problems within 5 minutes, unlike other supercomputers that would take a thousand quadrillion years to solve a massively complex problem.

A qubit, aka quantum bit, is the most fundamental unit of information in quantum computing. More qubits lead to higher computational power. Nevertheless, it also increases the possibility of more errors. Therefore, the inflated number of mistakes can give inaccurate results, which makes the technology unreliable for large-scale practical applications like crypto encryption.

According to Hartmut Neven, the lead at Google’s Quantum AI, Willow can make corrections to errors exponentially while performing complex computations at astonishing speed. He says “This mind-boggling number exceeds known timescales in physics and vastly exceeds the age of the universe”

He added that this chip is “able to drive errors down while scaling up the number of qubits.” He mentions it as overcoming a “key challenge” of quantum problems that experts have been dealing with for “almost 30 years”.

Is it a threat to crypto encryption?

The crypto industry has been concerned about progress in quantum computing. These advancements could enable hackers to break crypto encryption, leaving the user’s funds exposed on a large scale.

Q: Can Google's Willow crack Bitcoin?

Estimates indicate that compromising Bitcoin's encryption would necessitate a quantum computer with approximately 13 million qubits to achieve decryption within a 24-hour period.

In contrast, Google's Willow chip, while a significant…

— Kevin Rose (@kevinrose) December 9, 2024

A Tech entrepreneur and former Google senior product manager, Kevin Rose argued on Dec. 9 in a post on X that Willow is still a long way from being a cryptocurrency danger.

To be able to crack the Bitcoin encryption, a quantum computer with around 13 million qubits would have to complete the task in 24 hours, he said.

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