Post-quantum cryptography is becoming a major focus in the blockchain industry, as researchers prepare for future threats posed by quantum computers; a new report from BNB Chain Research suggests that the greatest challenge facing blockchain networks may not be consensus systems, but the significant increase in transaction and block sizes caused by quantum-resistant signatures.
Transition to post-quantum security
This study explores how to leverage ML-DSA-44 transaction signatures and pqSTARK aggregation technology to enable BSC’s transition into the post-quantum security era, aiming to replace current cryptographic systems—such as ECDSA and BLS—that are potentially vulnerable to quantum attacks.
According to the report, post-quantum readiness is technically feasible now. However, doing so comes at a significant cost.
Current blockchain transactions are relatively small, but post-quantum signatures are significantly larger. Currently, a typical transaction on BSC is about 110 bytes. Switching to ML-DSA-44 increases the average transaction size to approximately 2.5 KB. Under similar transaction loads, block size rises from about 130 KB to nearly 2 MB.
Can throughput issues be resolved?
This growth directly impacts network performance. Tests show that throughput decreased by approximately 40% to 50% due to longer propagation times for larger data blocks across nodes. Final confirmation latency across regions also increased, particularly under high load.
Researchers say the main bottleneck is not the consensus mechanism itself, which remains efficient thanks to pqSTARK compression technology, reducing validator signature data by approximately 43 times. Instead, the biggest issue is that the network needs to transmit much larger amounts of data.
The report also explains why BNB researchers chose ML-DSA-44 over larger variants. The selected version provides sufficient security while maintaining smaller signatures and faster verification, making it more suitable for high-throughput blockchain environments.
For average users, there is currently no direct danger. Quantum computers are not yet capable of breaking the encryption of Bitcoin or Bitcoin Storage Controllers (BSC) in real-world conditions. This research is part of long-term preparation, not an emergency response.
However, research findings indicate that blockchain may ultimately require significant infrastructure upgrades to meet the data demands of post-quantum cryptography while maintaining speed and scalability.