In response to quantum threats, the American Institute of Technology suggests expanding AES Block and Secret Key to 256 bits.

The recent hot discussion in the crypto world is due to the advancement in quantum physics, which may pose a threat to BTC encryption algorithms in the future. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in the United States has recently proposed standardizing the advanced encryption standard (AES) used in Block and key length to 256 bits to counter the rapidly rising risk. Google's new generation chip, Willow, has attracted widespread attention because the company claims that the chip has successfully overcome the key challenges of quantum computing, enabling computation with 105 quantum bits (qubits), solving problems that would take traditional computers 1 billion years in just 5 minutes. It was previously reported that physicist Pierre-Luc Dallaire-Demers from the University of Calgary in Canada warned that it will take about five years for quantum computers to crack BTC Wallets. A study from the University of Kent's School of Computing in the UK also indicates that in order to effectively defend against the threat posed by quantum computing, BTC needs protocol updates, at the cost of a 76-day full network shutdown. Due to the early use of the Pay-to-Public-Key (P2PK) format for BTC Addresses, the community has even sparked a heated debate on whether to freeze Satoshi Nakamoto's Wallet. NIST has proposed standardizing the AES to 256 bits, and has released the post-quantum cryptography standard to provide specific guidance for governments and enterprises to counter the quantum threat. The AES is the most popular standard in symmetric key encryption, while BTC does not adopt traditional RSA encryption algorithms (asymmetric encryption algorithms), but uses the Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm (ECDSA) to generate Public Key and Private Key, and uses the double SHA-256 algorithm to enhance security. Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin pointed out in a blog post on October 29 that the significant risk posed by quantum computers will not appear for decades. Blockstream founder and CEO Adam Back also emphasized the difficulty of increasing the number of quantum bits and predicted that it will be decades before quantum computing poses a threat to BTC. Instead, he believes that quantum computing may enhance the security of BTC, driving developers to build a network resistant to quantum attacks without the need for a complete overhaul of the BTC Blockchain.