Q-Day is looming. Here is how corporate investors are preparing - Global Venturing
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Quantum computers will be able to crack encrypted data within seconds. Corporate investors, particularly telecoms companies, are now actively investing in technologies that can protect them.
For Joshuah Lebacq, an investor for the National Bank of Canada, quantum computing is not only an opportunity for the financial institution but also a big threat. The danger comes in the power of quantum computers to break encrypted data so that it is no longer secure. It is a big worry for any company or sector that deals in private data such as banks, blockchain, government and telecommunications. “The main concern is about how, if your infrastructure is not quantum proof, which a lot of solutions are not, as soon as there is a powerful enough quantum computer, it is going to be able to break it,” says Lebacq, partner at NAventures, the corporate venture arm of the National Bank of Canada. The idea of Q-Day, the moment when quantum computers can break through encrypted data, has been around for a while, but the threat could be coming sooner than previously thought. Some predict quantum computers capable of unlocking today’s public key cryptography could emerge as soon as 2028. Harvest data now, decrypt later In preparation for Q-Day, adversaries are believed to be harvesting data now and storing it so that when quantum computers emerge, they will have the data at hand to decrypt. “What we are talking about here is a lot of the digital infrastructure we rely on that we built a trillion-dollar industry on suddenly goes dark,” says Chris Erven, chief commercial officer and co-founder of KETS Quantum Security, a spinout from the University of Bristol in the UK. Corporate venture investors are preparing for the threat by investing in quantum security technologies that aim to make encrypted data so secure that not even the most powerful quantum supercomputer can crack. Want to read more? Subscribe to GCV+ for corporate venturing news ✓ Unlimited access to Global Corporate Venturing editorial articles ✓ Annual benchmarking report and sector and thematic reports ✓ Full access to The CVC Directory and The CVC Funding Round Database ✓ GCV events early access and special discounts Subscribe to GCV+ Username Password Remember Me Forgot Password Kim Moore Kim Moore is the editor of Global University Venturing and deputy editor of Global Corporate Venturing and produces video for the website. Email LinkedIn