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Quantum Computing Regulation Already?
RMX writes "A new CNet article discusses the possibility of regulating quantum computing.
We already see our top tier US VCs investing in Quantum computing companies outside the country. Apparently the feds seem to think regulating the amount of technology that can be sent overseas will make the US safer." From the article: "Only rough prototypes of quantum computers presently exist. But if a large-scale model can be built, in theory it could break codes used to scramble information on the Internet, in banking, and within federal agencies. A certain class of encryption algorithms relies for security on the near-impossibility of factoring large numbers quickly. But quantum computers, at least on paper, can do that calculation millions of times faster than a conventional microprocessor. "
By reading the regulations we change them, so we can't ever know what they actually are.
You can't handle the truth.
"quantum computers, at least on paper, can do that calculation millions of times faster than a conventional microprocessor."
Wow, imagine what they can do on silicone!
I have no doubt the USA, Canada, and the UK will make it illegal to own one to keep code breaking superiority with the governments' spies, rather than criminal organizations.
Does this mean that I shouldn't bother with a 28 character bank password, since it's all going to be moot anyway?
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
Even if the US regulates what can be exported, how will that stop other countries from developing their own quantum computers with the same technology? We can't count on everyone else having slower computers if faster ones exist...
Quantum mechanics is just a theory, so Quantum Computers will never work.
Like the Kansas Board of Education, we need to proactively discard these so-called "scientific theories" and go back to Intelligently Designed machines, like the abacus.
Can't that same concept be applied to encrypting the data as well? I mean, if it can break current encryption easily, wouldn't the logic here be that it's capable of an encryption that would take even a quantum computer decades to crack? Or am I missing something here?
Not at all -- if you believe that quantum computers will actually work well enough to factor in the real world (many computer scientists don't -- the degree of precision required would be many orders of magnitude greater than any observations of any physical laws have ever been in a real experiment), you're only talking about making some particular one-way functions (in this case, factoring) useless.
In fact, part of the power of quantum computing is that (even without the somewhat less plausible factoring algorithm) we would have real secure encryption -- secure based not on the assumption that factoring is hard (which it may not be), but that quantum physics is true (which it may not be, but a lot of people seem more comfortable with this assumption, at least as far as cryptography is involved).
I am the man with no sig!
You are referring no doubt to quantum cryptography. This is an area which actually is only related to quantum computing loosely at best. We are already capable of implementing it somewhat practically - unlike quantum computing.
Quantum cryptography isn't really cryptography - it is instead a method of transmitting data between two points without relays which can allow sender and receiver to determine whether the transmission was intercepted. In practice it can be used for symmetric key exchange (such as a one time pad). If the key wasn't intercepted you use it, if it was then you just keep trying until the interceptor (or you) gives up.
The problem with quantum crypto is that it requires a direct transmission of photons from Alice to Bob. You can't have a relay station in-between, unless you are willing to guarantee its security (any relay station would allow for interception of the signal when it isn't entangled - which cannot be detected).
The bottom line right now is that it only works for very sensitive communications via line of sight or fiber optic. Most people submitting their credit card numbers to a website don't have a direct fiber optic line without retransmission between them and the merchant.
My guess is that quantum crypto won't ever prove to be very practical for general use - except maybe in space (where lines of sight extend much farther).