Odaily Planet Daily reports: Ethereum researchers have proposed a new plan to restructure the deposit contract used for validators to join the network, preparing for future defense against quantum computing attacks.
This proposal aims to upgrade Ethereum’s validator registration mechanism by adding support for cryptographic algorithm switching, enabling the network to future-proof against quantum-resistant signature schemes. Currently, Ethereum validators use BLS signatures, which rely on elliptic curve cryptography that is theoretically vulnerable to quantum computers running Shor’s algorithm.
The deposit contract is the entry point for users to stake ETH and become validators. Currently, approximately 42.4 million ETH are staked, valued at around $104 billion, and these assets are secured by existing BLS verification keys. Researchers note that because the current contract hardcodes the BLS key size, Ethereum cannot directly support new post-quantum signature standards even if the community adopts them in the future.
Currently, the proposal is still in an early draft stage and has not been formally numbered; some repository maintainers have suggested labeling it EIP-8394. If approved, the new version of the deposit contract will allow multiple cryptographic schemes to coexist, using a tagging system to distinguish between different signature systems: BLS signatures will be labeled as 0, and future post-quantum schemes can use new tags. (CoinDesk)