Forget AI doom... Quantum computing will break the internet first

Quantum computing poses a more immediate and concrete threat to internet security than AI doomsday scenarios. Shor's algorithm, published in 1994, can theoretically break RSA and elliptic curve cryptography — the foundation of modern TLS, SSH, and code signing. Recent breakthroughs from Google and Oratomic have dramatically reduced the estimated qubit count needed to break P256 elliptic curve encryption from millions to roughly 10,000, pushing 'Q-day' much closer than the previously assumed 2035–2040 window. Cloudflare has accelerated its post-quantum roadmap, targeting full post-quantum security by 2029. The most dangerous threat isn't just 'harvest now, decrypt later' attacks on encrypted traffic — it's the ability to forge authentication signatures on long-lived root certificates and code signing keys, enabling impersonation and persistent access. Migrating to post-quantum signatures also requires actively disabling legacy algorithms to prevent downgrade attacks and rotating all previously exposed credentials.