0:00

Hey, real quick before you listen to the show, I want

0:02

to tell you about the Web3 show that

0:04

Travis and Chris Snook are doing. You're

0:07

going to want to check that out if you like all things Web3.

0:09

That is Web3Show.io. Bitcoin,

0:14

the most decentralized trustless

0:17

cryptocurrency in the world.

0:19

Its immutable ledger is unhackable,

0:22

but will it always be that way?

0:24

Well, Google just announced a new quantum

0:26

computer that can change everything

0:29

and perhaps

0:30

pose a major threat to the Bitcoin

0:32

network. Today, we bring you what we've learned

0:35

so far about how quantum computing

0:37

can ruin everything for Bitcoin.

0:39

So let's go down the rabbit hole together and find

0:41

out if it means the end of this podcast

0:44

on episode number 688 of the Bad Crypto Podcast.

1:18

And

1:18

if quantum computing does destroy

1:21

Bitcoin, then your hosts here will have to find

1:23

another career. It means we're done,

1:26

Sir Lord Travis. We're washed up. It's over.

1:28

No, it just means that we just shift

1:30

and become the Bad Quantum

1:32

Podcast. We become experts on that. Just

1:35

like a couple of weeks ago, I was an expert on

1:37

Titanic submarines. This week,

1:40

I know all about Instagram

1:42

threads. So, you know, just dude,

1:45

welcome to the Bad Crypto Podcast, by the way, gang,

1:47

in case you don't know where you ended

1:48

up, Joel Common, Travis right here, the Sir

1:51

Lords in your life, and everybody needs a couple

1:53

Sir Lords. That whole, what

1:56

was the last thing he said? Not the Titanic. Well,

1:58

threads. I'm

2:00

already out. I'm like, I'm seeing

2:02

how much data they have access

2:05

to how much permission you're

2:07

giving Zuckerberg. It is more

2:09

spyware than anything I've ever seen before.

2:11

And people are just like, okay, here, Mark,

2:14

we trust you. Yeah.

2:15

They're like, Oh, we don't want to give this billionaire

2:18

Elon Musk any money. We're going to go over

2:20

here to threads, which

2:22

Mark Zuckerberg owns Facebook,

2:25

Instagram, WhatsApp, Oculus,

2:28

and now threads. Come on. Free

2:33

thought and free thinking, free speech in

2:35

theory. And the other ones like I'm seeing, I,

2:38

I went in there and I was watching so many, Oh,

2:40

deleted account, man, deleted. So

2:42

it's like, honey pop. Yeah. People are like,

2:45

we don't want to suck this billionaire's deck. We're going to go over

2:47

here and suck this

2:48

billionaire with a smaller deck stack, who's a

2:50

bigger deck. Do

2:53

you have any posted photos? I saw yesterday

2:55

on Instagram, sucks all swole. He's

2:57

been working with like some jujitsu shit.

2:59

So if they ever do have a cage match,

3:01

it's going to be hilarious. Well,

3:04

Musk will bring rockets. I mean, it needs

3:06

to be like terminator style, right? They need

3:08

to be fully out of it.

3:10

And they're like, exactly wheeled out in a stretcher

3:13

because the rock exploded on him or something.

3:15

I don't know. It's just crazy. It's a crazy world out there folks,

3:18

but that's not necessarily the topic of the day. That's just

3:20

a little bit of banter that

3:22

we have going on. No extra

3:24

charge for the banter. Yeah.

3:27

So you went down a rabbit hole here this

3:29

week, as you discovered there

3:31

was breaking news from Google that

3:34

they have

3:35

developed and will soon be releasing

3:37

a new quantum computer

3:40

and people in the crypto world

3:42

are going, wait,

3:43

does this mean that all of a sudden the

3:45

Bitcoin network will be hackable?

3:48

So tell me what you discovered. So

3:50

I've been using an app called feedly and

3:52

feedly really brings to the surface

3:54

a lot of top articles. And if

3:56

you don't use it, you can utilize it and find

3:59

some really great stuff.

3:59

You can segment information. I got

4:02

a crypto segment. I have an AI segment,

4:04

and I'm just looking for interesting components

4:07

around technology and

4:09

this sort of emerging world that we're in. And

4:11

this surfaced from the Telegraph talking

4:14

about how this actually

4:16

popped out about a week or so ago, where

4:18

Google, they've claimed to prove its supremacy

4:21

over conventional computers

4:23

with their new quantum computer.

4:26

And what they're saying is this quantum

4:29

computer

4:29

and instantly make calculations

4:32

that would take the very best top

4:34

of the line supercomputers

4:37

of today,

4:38

47 years to do that

4:41

it can do in a second. And

4:44

so I started going, well, whoa, wait a second.

4:46

If they're able to start doing that and start

4:49

creating these super powerful computers, and then we already

4:52

know what's happening with AI with existing

4:55

supercomputers, like how does this

4:57

impact Bitcoin, Joel?

5:00

How does that impact that 256 shaw encryption that

5:04

we've been told is flawless and unbreakable,

5:06

and it would take a billion million, a billion

5:08

trillion, a trillion years to break

5:10

it. And now we're talking about how

5:13

that's maybe flipped on its head.

5:15

Well, it destroys the network, right?

5:18

It brings the value of Bitcoin

5:22

down into the dirt because it's

5:24

no longer usable, right? If it can

5:26

be hacked and taken, I mean,

5:28

you've got all these Bitcoin that are lost

5:31

out there, right? That nobody's got

5:33

claimed to because they can't get it. So if somebody comes

5:35

along and claims 4 million

5:38

Bitcoin, you know, all of a sudden

5:40

that's the end of the network. You've destroyed

5:43

it. People will sell what they were able to take

5:46

and crash it and it's done.

5:48

Yeah, so back

5:51

in 2019, Google released

5:53

a quantum computer that had 53 qubits,

5:56

Q-U-B-I-T-S.

5:59

what a computer a qubit is.

6:02

I thought that was that little guy in the video game.

6:04

Yeah. Oh, that's Q Burt. Q Burt,

6:07

nevermind. Oh, that's Q Burt. Those are a little different.

6:09

Q Burt, Q bit is like, I think a fuck

6:11

ton of computing power or

6:13

something. 241 million times more powerful than

6:15

the 2019 machine. Not 241

6:20

times more powerful, 241 million times. Million

6:26

times.

6:28

Powerful. Yeah. So,

6:31

I mean, I don't know. I'm

6:33

pretty optimistic. You know, we've always been like,

6:35

yeah, Bitcoin's the one it's the winner. And I'm

6:38

like, okay. And I'm down with that. And

6:40

then I've had this question multiple times

6:42

over the year, Joel. I remember when we were in

6:45

Paris, France for the Paris

6:47

blockchain week. And then we were on our

6:49

way going over to that stadium,

6:52

that soccer stadium, we're having that dinner and

6:54

thing over there. I actually wrote in

6:56

an Uber over with this dude who was a quantum

6:58

computer guy. And so I asked him,

7:01

and I said, what is gonna happen

7:03

when quantum computers get so powerful

7:05

that they could crack

7:07

the encryption of Bitcoin? And

7:09

he goes, well, what would

7:12

ideally happen would be Bitcoin

7:15

protocol would be modified by

7:17

the Bitcoin core developers.

7:20

And they would preventively prevent

7:23

that from happening. And

7:26

I said, okay, so what are the odds? He

7:28

goes, it's very low that that would even happen.

7:31

So

7:32

yesterday I tweeted out about this, Joel.

7:34

I was like, okay, because I just, I wanted to get in the,

7:36

I want to get the conversation, at least thinking about it.

7:38

Because once I read that, it

7:41

sort of spurred some of my previous

7:43

thinkings around that. And

7:45

so I tweeted out about that. I

7:47

said, okay, so here we are with

7:49

this quantum computing

7:52

that can do this and that and that and this.

7:55

I go, I asked, I said, I don't even

7:57

know who the experts would be to listen to on the topic

7:59

of quantum.

7:59

computer crack Bitcoin's encryption.

8:02

I go at Nick Zabo for Adam

8:06

three US at LOP. Do you have

8:08

any resource for us plebes to read up

8:10

on the topic? And then Jameson Lop,

8:12

he sent me over this article. Here's why quantum

8:15

computing will not break

8:17

cryptocurrencies and you can pull that article

8:19

up. And I looked at it and I go, dude, this is fucking 2020.

8:24

If we just now have a new quantum computer

8:26

that comes out that's 241 million times more powerful than

8:30

the one in 2019, then that

8:32

potential article is moot. Which

8:35

would bring it to me Joel is like, damn, if

8:37

Jameson Lop, one of the top sort of

8:40

minds in OG Bitcoin

8:42

and developing it is feeling complacent

8:45

around this and just haphazardly sending

8:47

me an article from 2020. And

8:50

I don't know if they're looking into the implications of

8:52

how big and bad ass

8:55

this quantum computer could be. And

8:57

I could just be an idiot and not know, but

8:59

it seems like something we should be talking

9:01

about. Well, I can tell you why he might,

9:04

you know, Jameson might be a little screwed up about

9:06

it because he was circumcised and closed

9:08

the circle, you know, in the beginning, that's why they call

9:10

him LOP.

9:12

That's. I think

9:14

that was a conversation we had before

9:16

we recorded. So

9:19

my question is in this Forbes article,

9:22

here's why quantum computing

9:24

will not break cryptocurrencies, by the way, links

9:26

to these articles, all the show notes at badco.in

9:30

forward slash 688. What

9:32

is the conclusion that they come to

9:35

of why quantum computing

9:38

cannot, even if quantum computing

9:40

is successful, why it can't break,

9:43

you know, the Bitcoin blockchain?

9:44

Yeah,

9:46

it says it's, I don't even know

9:49

that the, this

9:51

article right here needs to be kind of dumbed down because they're

9:53

talking about the Turing test and all this other

9:55

stuff. It's something about the encryption.

9:59

itself, Shaw 256, they're

10:02

saying is theorized to be quantum

10:05

resistant. Now, I'm not sure I understand

10:07

exactly why that would be. You

10:09

know, if this thing can do

10:12

that many calculations that quickly, it's not

10:14

just a threat to the Bitcoin network. It's

10:16

a threat to any network that depends

10:18

on security and encryption. Right. We're talking

10:20

about national security. Right.

10:23

We're talking if you have a quantum

10:25

computer that can, that can conduct

10:27

that many calculations that rapidly,

10:30

you're going to have all kinds of espionage

10:33

going on. You're going to have all kinds of data

10:35

theft. It's not just the Bitcoin network that

10:37

this poses a threat to.

10:41

It's not. And I mean, it's just

10:43

really weird when I look at this and I think,

10:45

wow, here's the first time that a

10:47

corporation has

10:50

sort of nation state type

10:52

technologies like, you know, quantum

10:56

warfare is something that could be a real

10:58

legitimate thing when you have these quantum

11:00

computers to coordinate

11:03

attacks on, on, on

11:05

certain systems. Right. That's

11:07

when, when things could get really crazy. Now,

11:10

all it takes is one asshole with power to

11:12

be able to do something because they're in a pissed off mood.

11:14

I mean, you know, you see people are

11:16

weird out there today. There's very little empathy, very

11:18

little compassion. And so if they could

11:21

do something to screw over a whole bunch

11:23

of people, they're like, yeah, and then put me on the

11:25

news and look how cool I am. And

11:27

it's like people want to be famous at any cost.

11:29

And sometimes they'd rather be infamous than

11:32

anything at all. So I look at this and

11:34

I say, all right. So, you know,

11:38

here's why I did a summary of that particular

11:40

article. And it says this is like, first, you need

11:42

to know what a quantum computer is. Imagine

11:44

you're playing with Legos in your normal

11:46

computer. It's like having two Lego bricks,

11:48

one black one and one white one. But

11:51

in a quantum computer, it's like

11:53

having a Lego brick that can be black and

11:55

white at the same time and can

11:57

change color in the blink of an eye. That's.

11:59

what's called a qubit. So it's like

12:02

having multiple computers at the same

12:04

time running simultaneously in theory.

12:08

And so it's like

12:10

quantum computers can be the normal

12:12

computer in pretty much anything it would seem,

12:15

but with these secret

12:17

codes, these algorithms and these encryption

12:21

devices

12:22

that it's these puzzles

12:24

solving algorithms. You know,

12:27

if you have a really big quantum computer,

12:29

you could potentially crack those things, it

12:31

would seem to me. So it's kind of scary.

12:34

So if you read to the end

12:36

of this Forbes article that Jamison sent

12:38

you, it says, so quantum computers

12:40

being added to the mix won't suddenly render

12:42

classical modes of encryption useless or mining

12:45

trivial. Quantum supremacy now

12:47

doesn't mean that your encryption or the security

12:50

of Bitcoin is at risk right

12:52

at this moment. But then it goes on and

12:54

it says the real threat is when quantum computers

12:56

become many scales larger than they currently

12:59

are. Again, this is three years ago, by which

13:01

point planning for post quantum encryption,

13:04

which is already on the way, and at which point

13:06

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies can soft

13:08

fork and use decentralized governance

13:11

and dynamism when needed in

13:13

the face of new existential threats

13:15

to defeat the threat of quantum supremacy. So basically

13:17

what it's saying is you got to update the software

13:20

or it is at risk. I mean,

13:23

this article that he sent you actually

13:25

concludes with, hey, three years ago,

13:27

this wasn't a problem immediately,

13:30

but by the time we are at the scale

13:32

that Google is talking about now, it can

13:34

definitely become a problem.

13:36

So it looks to me

13:38

that what we're talking about then is this post

13:41

quantum cryptography. What

13:43

are those standards going to be? And how is

13:45

that going to be implemented into

13:47

the Bitcoin blockchain,

13:50

right? Because if that protocol gets cracked,

13:52

and then that could be really helpful

13:55

if everything was on the up and up and we're like, hey,

13:57

quantum computer guy thing. I

14:00

lost 55 Bitcoin back in 2011, 2012. Is

14:04

there any way you can help me

14:07

get those? No, they're going to go out.

14:10

If you're Google or you're a state

14:12

government and you have the ability

14:14

to crack the 256 shaw

14:17

and you're able to claim all of those Bitcoins

14:19

that were never able to be moved or upgraded

14:21

or updated or whatever, now imagine

14:23

if you have 4 to 6

14:25

million Bitcoin and you own 25

14:28

to 30% of the entire network, dude, that's

14:30

nuts.

14:35

That's like some James

14:37

Bond shit.

14:39

You know what? We're going to talk

14:42

to a guy who has a better grasp

14:44

on this than we

14:46

do for next week's show. You can consider

14:49

this part one where we're just going

14:51

down the rabbit hole, but we want to talk to somebody

14:53

that's way smarter than us, way more informed

14:55

that has info. Tell us about this gentleman

14:57

that we're going to be bringing on.

14:59

Yeah. So this dude, he

15:02

engaged with me on my conversation

15:04

about this on Twitter. His name

15:06

is Pierre Luke. He's the founder

15:08

and CEO of a company called Polygroup and

15:11

he's in the quantum physics, AI, blockchain

15:14

and society. And he's a pretty

15:16

interesting dude. And so let's

15:19

have him on and have a conversation

15:21

because what's happening with quantum

15:24

computing? I mean,

15:26

this is, it's not here.

15:28

We don't have access to it. Regular people

15:30

don't have access to quantum computing. However,

15:33

really big tech corporations

15:36

are becoming more quantum

15:39

compute savvy. And

15:42

some of the tools they have are, they're going to be able to start

15:44

doing some stuff with them, which is only going to make

15:46

them more powerful. So I think

15:48

it'd be a good idea to have this dude on the show. I

15:50

don't know anything about Polygroup and it's not

15:53

a paid thing. It's just, here's the dude

15:55

who is one of the top minds in quantum

15:57

science and cryptography. And he.

15:59

going to have some insight. He said that

16:02

with the new technologies that Bitcoin's current

16:04

encryption could be cracked in about 10

16:06

minutes. That's what he said. My gosh.

16:09

So we're looking forward to speaking with him. That'll be

16:11

next week's episode. This is a short episode

16:13

because our quantum brains got

16:15

to work and we condensed about 60

16:18

minutes worth of content in about 15,

16:20

20 minutes for you. This was about 37 qubits

16:23

worth of information. And one see it's like,

16:25

it's way quicker now. It's we're becoming

16:27

less bad. I think it's actually decent. We're

16:30

going to be not, not the not so bad

16:33

crypto network. By the way, also next

16:35

week is our sixth anniversary

16:38

of this show, Sir Lord Travis. Can you believe

16:41

that six years of bass?

16:44

So that'd be good. We'll have some dude coming on, chatting about

16:46

quantum computing and Bitcoin

16:50

at our sixth anniversary. So that's not going to be

16:52

too shabby at all, huh? Maybe we'll, uh, the show

16:54

after that, maybe that'll be our official celebration. Cause

16:56

I don't want to delay having this guy on, uh,

17:00

tomorrow.

17:00

So we can probably release that next

17:03

show probably on Monday. And then

17:05

on Tuesday, maybe we do a, maybe we do a Twitter

17:07

space.

17:08

That could be kind of fun and invite. I don't

17:10

mind doing Twitter spaces. I mean, I've been enjoying them.

17:13

And then

17:14

we have a couple of our fans, everybody left

17:17

to go to threads anyway. So yeah,

17:19

they can, they can have it. I made a few

17:21

posts there and I'm going to delete the

17:23

app. I'm going to leave my account cause I know, but want anybody

17:26

else taking my name, but

17:28

I would say this, put it on. I took

17:30

it off of my main device and I put

17:32

it on my iPad. So I'm

17:35

going to, I'm going to keep it and I'm going to do stuff on

17:37

it every once in a while on my iPad. Wait,

17:39

what's the difference? Does it not have

17:42

access to all your health data? I'm not going

17:44

to have access to stuff, you know, cause basically

17:46

I don't have, well, I don't know how you have your

17:49

iPad set up. I have my iMac set up

17:51

a little different than my main device. And

17:53

so they're not going to be able to pull a bunch of information from

17:55

it. However, what people are talking

17:58

about that they have threads on, there's so much.

17:59

much surveillance and shit going on on that app,

18:02

that it is sucking

18:04

their batteries

18:05

down very quickly. And

18:07

so I think, you know, who would have

18:09

thought that all that tracking shit, they

18:12

want to know not only do they want to know all

18:14

your online purchases, every website

18:16

in your browser history on any browser

18:19

that you've been in, they want to know your your

18:22

political stance, they want to know your religious

18:25

stance, they want they actually somehow

18:27

get access to your credit score, they

18:29

get access to all your health data, like,

18:32

who would willingly give this information

18:34

to anyone, and then threads is

18:36

just pulling it. And then they say,

18:38

Oh, by the way, if you want, you can't

18:40

really delete your data, or delete

18:43

your account unless you delete your Instagram account.

18:45

So it's just a really bullshittery going on.

18:48

And I come back to this tinfoil hat, Joel,

18:50

back in February of 2004,

18:54

the very day that Facebook

18:56

was created was the very day

18:58

that DARPA shut down their life

19:00

log project coincidence,

19:03

total coincidence, right? Well, then you look at

19:05

life log and what they wanted to do, they

19:07

wanted to be able to gather what they literally

19:09

said as threads of

19:12

information from all the users,

19:14

everywhere they go, everywhere they've been, the

19:16

places they visited, blah, blah, blah. And

19:19

then look, and what happened was the

19:21

VCs of the of the deep

19:23

state basically helped fund Facebook,

19:26

got it through all the big, you

19:28

know, you know, Harvard

19:31

and Yale and all those Ivy League schools

19:33

first, and then proliferated

19:35

it over to Stanford and everywhere

19:37

else. And now look at it, they got fucking

19:40

Instagram, WhatsApp, all

19:42

your virtual reality with the quest

19:45

with the quest and Oculus. And

19:47

now it's just unbelievable the

19:49

amount of data and so I look at this as

19:51

how they become one of the most powerful

19:53

companies in the world. How have they done

19:56

that? Some freshmen in the Harvard

19:58

dorm just came up with it by

19:59

by saying, hey, you're hot, you're not. And

20:02

then all of a sudden that turned into the biggest data

20:05

honeypot of all time. I don't

20:07

know. Consider me a little

20:09

suspicious on all that, Mr. Joel. I

20:11

think with the right to

20:14

be so. So appreciate you guys joining

20:17

us for this episode. Make sure you do not miss

20:19

next week's when we speak with an actual

20:22

person who knows something about this

20:24

whole quantum computing. We'll catch you then, and

20:27

we will count on you until then to

20:29

stay back.

20:29

Stay back.

20:31

Stay back. Who's

20:48

bad? The

20:51

Bad Crypto podcast is a production of Bad

20:53

Crypto, LLC. The content of

20:55

the show, the videos, and the website is

20:57

provided for educational, informational, and

20:59

entertainment purposes only. It's not intended

21:02

to be and does not constitute financial,

21:04

investment, or trading advice of any kind.

21:07

You shouldn't make any decisions as to finances,

21:10

investing, trading, or anything else based

21:12

on this information without undertaking

21:14

independent due diligence and consultation

21:16

with a professional financial advisor. Please

21:19

understand that the trading of Bitcoins and

21:21

alternative cryptocurrencies have potential

21:23

risks involved. Anyone wishing to invest

21:26

in any of the currencies or tokens mentioned on

21:28

this podcast should first seek their own

21:30

independent professional financial

21:32

advisor.