Nobel Prize-winning physicist warns Bitcoin faces threat from quantum computing

ChainCatcher report: John Martinis, former head of quantum hardware at Google and 2025 Nobel Prize winner in Physics, warned that Bitcoin could be among the first real-world targets of quantum computing attacks. He stated that recent Google research indicates advanced quantum computers could derive Bitcoin private keys within minutes, significantly undermining the computational security barrier the network currently relies on. Since Bitcoin depends on elliptic curve cryptography and features slow, decentralized upgrades, addressing the quantum threat is more challenging than in traditional financial systems. The window during which public keys are exposed when Bitcoin transactions are broadcast could be exploited by quantum computers to intercept funds before transaction confirmation. John Martinis emphasized that while building such quantum computers remains an extremely challenging engineering task, the community must not become complacent and should plan for quantum-resistant upgrades as soon as possible, with the threat expected to gradually materialize within the next 5 to 10 years.