Bitcoin's Quantum Vulnerability: A Governance Story

Bitcoin's vulnerability to quantum computers has been a topic of concern for some time, and Matthew Sigel, Head of Digital Assets Research at VanEck, weighed in on the issue. According to him, the threat is real, but the community is aware of it, and any remedy will arrive slowly due to Bitcoin's governance structure.

Sigel emphasized that decentralization, which is a key feature of Bitcoin, is also its bottleneck. He explained that whatever prevents one party from unilaterally rewriting Bitcoin's rules is the same thing that slows down upgrades. 'The upgrades don't happen as fast because there's no CEO who can tell the devs, 'hey, do it now,'

Sigel noted that developers are working on solutions, with some even trialing quantum-resistant signatures on live sidechains. Coinbase and Blockstream are among those pursuing solutions, and BlackRock and Fidelity have contributed money and engineers to open-source efforts behind proposals such as BIP-360.