#post-quantum-encryption

#post-quantum-encryption

The dataset reportedly contains more than 10 petabytes of sensitive information, including classified defense documents, missile schematics, and technical files, among others.

This happened in the early 1990s, when I was a young engineer starting an internship at one of the companies that helped create the smart card industry. I believed my card was secure. I believed the system worked. But watching strangers casually extract something that was supposed to be secret and protected was a shock. It was also the moment I realized how insecure security actually is, and the devastating impact security breaches could have on individuals, global enterprises, and governments.

NIST has developed a chip that reliably emits a single photon on demand. This ability will improve the efficiency of QKD (quantum key distribution) as we prepare for the arrival of quantum computers. Quantum computers will upend current cryptology by using Shor's algorithm to rapidly negate the current public/private key secure encryption methods. This has largely been solved by NIST's post quantum cryptology (PQC) algorithms.

Microsoft's BitLocker is a security feature built into Windows that encrypts the entire hard drive. The idea is to protect your personal files from prying eyes in case your PC is ever lost or stolen. Decrypting the data requires a BitLocker recovery key, which is supposed to be safe from access by other people. Aah, but not so fast. Microsoft has confirmed to Forbes that it will provide your BitLocker recovery key if it receives a valid legal order.

Meanwhile, the actual threat landscape evolved in an entirely different direction. Today's attackers aren't sitting at keyboards manually typing password guesses. They're running offline brute force attacks with dedicated GPU rigs that can attempt 100 billion passwords per second against hashing algorithms like MD5 or SHA-1. At that speed, your clever substitution of "@" for "a" buys you microseconds of additional security.