The Race to Avert Quantum Computing Threat With New Encryption Standards

They call it Q-Day: the day when a quantum computer, one more powerful than any yet built, could shatter the world of privacy and security as we know it. It would happen through a bravura act of mathematics: the separation of some very large numbers, hundreds of digits long, into their prime factors. That might sound like a meaningless division problem, but it would fundamentally undermine the encryption protocols that governments and corporations have relied on for decades. Sensitive information such as military intelligence, weapons designs, industry secrets and banking…

Quantum Tech Intended for National Security Is Testing U.S. Alliances

The Australian physicist shook the heavy metal box that resembled a beer cooler but held a quantum sensor. A computer screen showed that the cutting-edge device — with lasers manipulating atoms into a sensitive state — continued functioning despite the rattling. He and his team had built a hard-to-detect, super-accurate navigation system for when satellite GPS networks are jammed or do not work that was robust and portable enough to be used outside a lab. It could potentially guide military equipment, from submarines to spacecraft, for months with a minuscule…

U.S. Warns of Efforts by China to Collect Genetic Data

BETHESDA, Md. — Chinese firms are collecting genetic data from around the world, part of an effort by the Chinese government and companies to develop the world’s largest bio-database, American intelligence officials reported on Friday. The National Counterintelligence and Security Center said in a new paper that the United States needs to better secure critical technologies including artificial intelligence, quantum computing, semiconductors and other technologies related to the so-called bioeconomy. China and other countries are trying to dominate these technologies, and are using both legal and illegal means to acquire…