// post_quantum_security
A large enough quantum computer breaks the public-key cryptography protecting almost everything you send today. The migration isn't optional — and the clock started when NIST published the standards.
// the_threat
Here's the part most people miss: the quantum threat is already active. Adversaries can record your encrypted traffic today and decrypt it once a cryptographically-relevant quantum computer exists. Anything with a long secrecy shelf life — health records, legal files, state secrets, seed phrases — is being harvested right now against a future key.
The math is well understood. Shor's algorithm, run on a sufficiently large quantum computer, factors large integers and solves discrete logarithms efficiently — which breaks RSA and elliptic-curve cryptography. Grover's algorithm halves the effective strength of symmetric keys, which is why AES-256 is fine but AES-128 gets nervous.
// timeline
In August 2024, NIST published FIPS 203, 204, and 205 — the first finalized post-quantum cryptography standards. The starting gun for migration.
Long-lived secrets are being captured today. If your data must stay secret for 10+ years, you are already exposed.
Credible estimates place a machine capable of breaking RSA-2048 within the next decade or so. Nobody serious claims to know the exact year — which is precisely why you migrate before you're sure.
Federal guidance (OMB M-23-02 and the CNSA 2.0 suite) sets aggressive timelines to move systems to quantum-resistant algorithms. Vendors and their customers get pulled along.
// what_breaks
BROKEN
Public-key algorithms — RSA, ECDSA, Diffie-Hellman. These fall to Shor's algorithm entirely. This is your TLS key exchange, your code signing, your crypto-wallet signatures.
WEAKENED
Grover's algorithm halves symmetric strength. AES-128 drops to ~64-bit effective security. Move to AES-256. Legacy hashes were already dying — this buries them.
SAFE (for now)
Doubling the key size restores the margin. Symmetric crypto and strong hashes survive the transition — the crisis is concentrated in public-key algorithms.
// migration
You don't have to invent anything. NIST already picked the winners. The job is inventory, prioritize, and swap.
FIPS 203
Module-Lattice Key-Encapsulation Mechanism. This replaces RSA/ECDH for key exchange. It's the one you'll deploy first because TLS handshakes are everywhere.
FIPS 204
Module-Lattice Digital Signature Algorithm. The primary replacement for ECDSA/RSA signatures — code signing, certificates, authentication.
FIPS 205
A stateless hash-based signature scheme. Slower and larger, but built on conservative assumptions — a hedge in case lattice math surprises us.
// how_alliopsec_helps