post-quantum computing in GnuPG

Christopher J. Walters cwal989 at comcast.net
Wed Apr 2 10:54:51 CEST 2014


On 4/2/2014 2:50 AM, Robert J. Hansen wrote:
>> Or someone builds a working quantum computer with many bits and
>> demonstrate a working decryption of RSA-2048 in a few seconds. :-)

Not likely in the near term...  Maybe in 5000 years or so, but by then I 
suspect computing as we know it will be ancient history (actually it *would* be)...

> Well, you'd need 4096 qubits in the ensemble, representing a state space
> of something like 10^1233 (not a typo).

That's a LOT of zeroes.  Maybe my initial estimate was off by several dozen 
orders of magnitude...

> At that point I'm going to just give up and offer my services to our new
> Space Overlords from Zarbnulax Prime.  Maybe if I help round up pesky
> humans they'll give me a ride in their FTL spaceships!

LMAO!  I got a good laugh out of this one.  Thanks, I needed that...

>
> :)

Chris



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