Bitcoin Can Be Made Quantum-Safe Today, But It’ll Cost You $200 Per Transaction

TLDR

• A StarkWare researcher has created a way to make Bitcoin transactions quantum-safe without changing the Bitcoin protocol
• The method uses hash-based proofs instead of traditional digital signatures
• Each transaction costs between $75 and $200 in GPU computing power
• It is designed as a last-resort emergency tool, not a permanent fix
• Long-term solutions like BIP-360 exist but could take years to activate

A StarkWare researcher has published a new scheme that can make Bitcoin transactions resistant to quantum computer attacks, using the network’s existing rules and requiring no protocol changes.

The proposal, called Quantum Safe Bitcoin (QSB), was written by Avihu Levy, chief product officer at StarkWare. It was published this week and has already drawn attention across the Bitcoin community.

The idea works by replacing the standard digital signature system Bitcoin uses today with a hash-based proof system. Traditional Bitcoin signatures rely on elliptic curve math, which a powerful enough quantum computer could break in the future.

Hash-based proofs work differently. They create a unique mathematical fingerprint of data that is extremely hard to reverse or forge, even for a quantum computer running advanced algorithms like Shor’s algorithm.

The system requires no soft fork, no miner approval, and no activation timeline. That sets it apart from BIP-360, the existing quantum-resistance proposal that was added to Bitcoin’s improvement proposal repository in February but has no confirmed implementation date.

Why It’s Not for Everyone

The main drawback is cost. Generating a single QSB transaction requires searching through billions of possible inputs, a process that Levy estimates costs between $75 and $200 using standard cloud GPU hardware.

By comparison, a normal Bitcoin transaction currently costs around 33 cents.

The transactions are also non-standard. They would not travel through Bitcoin’s normal network like regular payments and would need to be sent directly to miners willing to process them.

QSB also does not work with the Lightning Network, Bitcoin’s faster and cheaper payment layer. That limits its use to large, high-value transfers where the extra cost can be justified.

StarkWare CEO Eli Ben-Sasson called the proposal “huge,” saying it essentially makes Bitcoin quantum-safe today. But Bitcoin ESG specialist Daniel Batten pushed back, calling that claim an overstatement.

Batten pointed out that exposed public keys and dormant wallets are not addressed in the paper. This includes an estimated 1.7 million Bitcoin locked in early addresses that a quantum computer could potentially crack.

Where Long-Term Solutions Stand

The researchers behind QSB acknowledged it is a last-resort measure. They stated that protocol-level changes remain the preferred long-term path.

BIP-360, which would introduce quantum-resistant signatures through a soft fork, is the main candidate for that. But its timeline is uncertain. Prediction market bettors are pricing in low odds of activation this year.

Bitcoin’s governance history suggests this could take time. Taproot, a previous upgrade, took about seven and a half years from concept to deployment.

Google published a paper in March suggesting quantum computers could crack Bitcoin’s cryptography using fewer resources than previously thought, which added urgency to the debate.

Lightning Labs CTO Olaoluwa Osuntokun separately published a quantum “escape hatch” prototype this week that lets users prove wallet ownership from a seed phrase without revealing it.

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