That’s fair, Shor’s algorithm would probably break a bunch of older encryption. It’s a little further out of reach, in terms of feasibility but who knows how fast it could speed up
Comment on A tangled web of deals stokes AI bubble fears in Silicon Valley
valgarf@discuss.tchncs.de 11 hours agoThe typical example is Shor’s algorithm
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shor's_algorithm
It allows to efficiently find the prime factors of an integer - a problem without a known polynomial algorithm on a classical computer.
This would directly break RSA encryption, as it relies on factorisation being difficult.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSA_cryptosystem
However, there are encryption algorithms that are considered safe even against a quantum computer.
frank@sopuli.xyz 11 hours ago
JustTesting@lemmy.hogru.ch 1 hour ago
Also the largest number ever factorized on a quantum computer (not simulated) is like 30. So this is like 1950’s level of computing(in terms of number of transistors vs qbits) and were 20-30 years of incremental change away from really threatening encryption