Given that China already graduates around twice the number of STEM people as US, I fully expect the gap is only going to widen going forward. China also has coordinated state driven tech research strategy as opposed to ad hoc efforts by different companies. China already has a functioning quantum netwrok in production, there’s nothing even close to that in the west right now.
I know, but the technology is still in its infancy, similar to the first PCs in the last century, where there were also big differences with Apple in the head, although today there are no big differences, regardless of the manufacturer or country, with more or less standardized values, depending on what you want to pay for this.
I imagine that, although the Chinese are currently leaders, once this technology is developed, few differences will exist.
The only thing that worries me is that it is precisely the large companies and totalitarian governments that are going to have this technology and not the user, in an internet with already losing privacy.
What possibilities will a user with a miserable laptop have to protect himself against Big Brother surveillance with a Quantum Computer?
We already live in a world of pervasive surveillance now, I don’t think quantum communication could make the situation worse in that regard. I do agree that it will likely be too expensive for regular people to use, so privacy will likely only be available to governments, corporations, and billionaires.
I agree that there are currently endless dirty tricks by large corporations to track user activities, but there are also good countermeasures available to at least alleviate it to a great extent.
But this with Quantum Computers will no longer be possible, for this the technologies that a user can have and those of large corporations is too disparate, with which the protections that a normal PC can include are equivalent to trying to avoid with duct tape the collapse of a building.
Encryptions where a powerful computer would need thousands of years to reveal it, in a Quantum computer it is possible in a few minutes, it is too great a technological leap.
This is only possible to alleviate, if the user also has a Quantum PC, which will be the case in the future, but in the meantime it is to be practically naked in front of these companies.
There are encryption algorithms that account for quantum computing. However, quantum network transmissions is a separate technology for quantum computing. What China developed is a way to create quantum encrypted communication channels that can’t be eavesdropped on. I don’t think anyone has working quantum computers yet.
Quantum communication can’t be intecepted or desencrypted, not even by other Quantum computer, it’s physically impossible due it’s nature, but every encrypted file or communication by a normal PC can be desencrypted easily by a Quantum computer, that is the problem for the user.
PD, IBM offers courses in Quantum computing online for free, giving free cloud access to their Quantum computer
https://quantum-computing.ibm.com
That’s incorrect, there are algorithms that can be used on classical computers that are impervious to quantum computer decryption. One-time pad cipher is an obvious example. Unless you know the pad there is insufficient information to retrieve the encoded message. Some other algorithms are discussed here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-quantum_cryptography
I was unaware of these systems, yet there remains a greater vulnerability to quantum computer attacks until the user don’t has it’s own.
Even today with traditional techniques it is increasingly difficult to protect yourself, since only Google introduces every little new dirty tricks on the network to facilitate user tracking, such as FloC (although with this it has hit the teeth in a singing, being rejected en masse by the main manufacturers), Idle detection, dozens of header and fingerprint sniffing systems, CSS exfil, CDN tracking, redirects, etc…
This with Quantum technology can only get worse.
Although strong encryption techniques can be applied, it will make things more difficult for the user as it is now to protect themselves.
The technological difference is abysmal between a normal PC and a Quantum computer with currently 60 Qbits and who knows, how much in the near future.
Bad for a free internet, it only leaves descentralized networks
As I said earlier, the reality of the situation is that it’s pretty much impossible to guarantee any kind of security against a determined attacker today. What quantum computing brings is the ability to guarantee secure communications which is practically impossible to do with traditional computers, and eventually this tech will get small and cheap enough to be accessible to individuals.
Ultimately, quantum computing is happening whether we like it or not. So, lamenting it seems kind of pointless to be honest. The cat is out of the bag, and there is a lot incentive to develop this technology.
Given that China already graduates around twice the number of STEM people as US, I fully expect the gap is only going to widen going forward. China also has coordinated state driven tech research strategy as opposed to ad hoc efforts by different companies. China already has a functioning quantum netwrok in production, there’s nothing even close to that in the west right now.
That’s impressive. The arpanet of quantum computing.
indeed :)
I know, but the technology is still in its infancy, similar to the first PCs in the last century, where there were also big differences with Apple in the head, although today there are no big differences, regardless of the manufacturer or country, with more or less standardized values, depending on what you want to pay for this. I imagine that, although the Chinese are currently leaders, once this technology is developed, few differences will exist. The only thing that worries me is that it is precisely the large companies and totalitarian governments that are going to have this technology and not the user, in an internet with already losing privacy. What possibilities will a user with a miserable laptop have to protect himself against Big Brother surveillance with a Quantum Computer?
We already live in a world of pervasive surveillance now, I don’t think quantum communication could make the situation worse in that regard. I do agree that it will likely be too expensive for regular people to use, so privacy will likely only be available to governments, corporations, and billionaires.
I agree that there are currently endless dirty tricks by large corporations to track user activities, but there are also good countermeasures available to at least alleviate it to a great extent. But this with Quantum Computers will no longer be possible, for this the technologies that a user can have and those of large corporations is too disparate, with which the protections that a normal PC can include are equivalent to trying to avoid with duct tape the collapse of a building. Encryptions where a powerful computer would need thousands of years to reveal it, in a Quantum computer it is possible in a few minutes, it is too great a technological leap. This is only possible to alleviate, if the user also has a Quantum PC, which will be the case in the future, but in the meantime it is to be practically naked in front of these companies.
There are encryption algorithms that account for quantum computing. However, quantum network transmissions is a separate technology for quantum computing. What China developed is a way to create quantum encrypted communication channels that can’t be eavesdropped on. I don’t think anyone has working quantum computers yet.
Quantum communication can’t be intecepted or desencrypted, not even by other Quantum computer, it’s physically impossible due it’s nature, but every encrypted file or communication by a normal PC can be desencrypted easily by a Quantum computer, that is the problem for the user. PD, IBM offers courses in Quantum computing online for free, giving free cloud access to their Quantum computer https://quantum-computing.ibm.com
That’s incorrect, there are algorithms that can be used on classical computers that are impervious to quantum computer decryption. One-time pad cipher is an obvious example. Unless you know the pad there is insufficient information to retrieve the encoded message. Some other algorithms are discussed here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-quantum_cryptography
I was unaware of these systems, yet there remains a greater vulnerability to quantum computer attacks until the user don’t has it’s own. Even today with traditional techniques it is increasingly difficult to protect yourself, since only Google introduces every little new dirty tricks on the network to facilitate user tracking, such as FloC (although with this it has hit the teeth in a singing, being rejected en masse by the main manufacturers), Idle detection, dozens of header and fingerprint sniffing systems, CSS exfil, CDN tracking, redirects, etc…
This with Quantum technology can only get worse. Although strong encryption techniques can be applied, it will make things more difficult for the user as it is now to protect themselves. The technological difference is abysmal between a normal PC and a Quantum computer with currently 60 Qbits and who knows, how much in the near future. Bad for a free internet, it only leaves descentralized networks
As I said earlier, the reality of the situation is that it’s pretty much impossible to guarantee any kind of security against a determined attacker today. What quantum computing brings is the ability to guarantee secure communications which is practically impossible to do with traditional computers, and eventually this tech will get small and cheap enough to be accessible to individuals.
Ultimately, quantum computing is happening whether we like it or not. So, lamenting it seems kind of pointless to be honest. The cat is out of the bag, and there is a lot incentive to develop this technology.