It reminds me a lot of Y2K. The fix is simple, but finding the places where it's needed and doing it in a compatible way are absolutely non-trivial problems. The best we can hope is the same as Y2K: the plethora of articles convince businesses to invest large amounts of money to migrate algorithms, so that when a quantum computer arrives it won't be a big deal.
reply> it won't be a big deal.
replyThis isn't a space I know too much about, but even if we all start using quantum-safe encryption for everything today, won't the arrival of quantum computers that can break traditional encryption not still be a big deal?
Given that intelligence agencies, tech companies and various bad actors have been storing encrypted data for a long time, hoping to decrypt when (if?) that day comes?
Definitely, but then the damage is limited to the encrypted data that those actors managed to intercept some years before. Compared to QC arriving to an unprepared world, that's a very limited impact.
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