The NSA is working on an encryption-breaking quantum computer

[rommelrommel]

If history is any guide, after the NSA gets their cracker working, the EFF, among others, will also get their cracker working. Board from EFF DES cracker shown above.

What is significant about a quantum computer is that, in theory, it should be very, very good at factoring the product of two large prime numbers.

If so, RSA would no longer be secure.

Uno

I'm surprised (and not convinced) that it's not been done already.

Don't turn around, oh oh oh, der comisar is in town.

You guys both seem to think it's pretty simple to make one... There are a lot of the best minds and research teams on the planet working on it and no one is close. The chances that the NSA has done it in secret is pretty low. The chances of the EFF going it is about zero.

 

[ForumMaster]

the fact that the NSA are doing is not surprising at all. if they weren't doing it, it would be. i'll assume some of you guys have head of DWave's quantum computers (NASA and Google bought them).

In theory, they could crack modern encryption schemes and render them useless. But it isn't something inherently special to the NSA. scientists have been working on this for years. true the NSA might/has a bigger budget but the implications of such a discovery would be so huge that it would be hard to keep secret.

scientists are also working on quantum encryption. have been for some time.
link

it is, like all things, a cat and mouse game.

 

[Greenman]

I'm surprised (and not convinced) that it's not been done already.

Don't turn around, oh oh oh, der comisar is in town.

I don't know if it's been done, but I know a fellow who works at a major university and his job is developing a quantum computer. He told me three years back that they had a working 2 bit model. It's not like the research is secret.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

I don't know if it's been done, but I know a fellow who works at a major university and his job is developing a quantum computer. He told me three years back that they had a working 2 bit model. It's not like the research is secret.

It's not secret but I believe no one has produced a functional and complete working system tthat we know of. Given that the government agencies budget may exceed that of all other sources combined it's not out of the realm if possibility and they won't share.

 

[Jaepheth]

http://www.pro-technix.com/information/crypto/pages/vernam_base.html

Not the most convenient method, but is secure against any analyses.