Google Quantum AI paper warns fewer qubits may break Bitcoin, Ethereum crypto

Google’s Quantum AI team said in a Tuesday whitepaper and blog post that Bitcoin and Ethereum cryptography tied to ECDLP-256 could be broken with fewer than 500,000 physical qubits and about 1,200 logical qubits. The paper also models a live Bitcoin attack that could steal coins mid-transaction in around 9 minutes, implying a 41% chance of beating Bitcoin’s 10-minute block time.