On-chain analyst Willy Woo issued a guide urging Bitcoin holders to move coins from Taproot addresses to older formats that conceal public keys behind cryptographic hashes, warning that quantum computers could compromise exposed keys as the technology matures.
The Bitcoin community remains divided over the urgency and effectiveness of migration strategies as quantum computing timelines compress toward the late 2020s.
Woo’s post on X outlined a six-step process for holders to protect their Bitcoin during what he called the “age of big scary quantum computers.”
Taproot addresses beginning with “bc1p” embed public keys directly into addresses, making them vulnerable once quantum machines develop enough processing power to derive private keys from public ones.
Meanwhile, he explained that older SegWit formats, starting with “bc1q,” and legacy addresses, beginning with “1” or “3,” conceal public keys behind hashing algorithms that provide temporary protection until transactions are broadcast, exposing the keys in mempools.
Migration Strategy Sparks Technical Debate Among Developers
Former Bitcoin Core developer Jonas Schnelli acknowledged that Pay-to-Public-Key-Hash addresses offer “years of protection” compared to Taproot’s immediate public key exposure.
However, Schnelli warned against calling Woo’s approach “quantum safe,” stating, “the moment you broadcast a spend, your pubkey hits the mempool. A quantum attacker could crack your key and RBF double-spend before your transaction confirms.“
Anakun from Open BTC offered detailed commentary highlighting Bitcoin Improvement Proposal BIP-360, which implements quantum-resistant ML-DSA signatures approved by the National Institute of Standards and Technology in 2024.
The migration plan developed by developer Jameson Lopp proposes a phased timeline spanning five years, with Phase A stopping payments to legacy addresses 160,000 blocks after the launch of BIP-360 and Phase B invalidating all non-quantum signatures 110,000 blocks later.
Anakun explained this proactive approach “prevents quantum computers from stealing vulnerable coins by making them unspendable before quantum computers can access them.“
Anakun contrasted Bitcoin’s adaptable UTXO architecture with Ethereum and Solana’s immutable smart contracts that permanently verify ownership through ECDSA signatures.
“When quantum computers break ECDSA, these contracts become vulnerable—Uniswap with $4B locked, AAVE with $12B, Compound with $2B,” Anakun wrote.
While Vitalik Buterin’s emergency hard fork plan could save ETH in regular accounts, Anakun noted “every smart contract deployed before the fork remains vulnerable forever” because “they all check ECDSA signatures at the contract level, not the protocol level.“
Industry Split on Timeline and Preparedness
Capital Markets analyst Charles Edwards sharply criticized Woo’s strategy, stating, “this ain’t quantum safe and if this is the model Bitcoin is doomed.”
Edwards warned that the approach requires “perfect, meticulous operations from users” while failing to prevent quantum attacks.
He argued it would “kill adoption completely, like send traffic to zero” and “doesn’t solve the 30% of lost/p2pk coins that will be stolen and market dumped.”
Edwards insisted “Bitcoin’s only hope is a consensus upgrade to the network, agreed in 2026,” advocating for immediate protocol changes rather than user-initiated migrations.
Woo defended his guide as an “intermediary measure,” responding to Edwards that “BTC remains the best monetary asset if you take a long time horizon beyond the next 10 years. Quantum will not break BTC because BTC will adapt.”
He explained that “general consensus among the experts is 2030+” for when quantum computers may threaten Bitcoin, with developers proposing “a 2-year intermediary plan and a 7-year plan.“
MicroStrategy Chairman Michael Saylor also recently dismissed quantum concerns as “mainly marketing by people who want to sell you their next quantum yo-yo token.”
Saylor argued that “Google and Microsoft aren’t going to sell you a quantum computer that cracks modern cryptography because it would destroy Google and Microsoft and the U.S. government.”
He estimated the threat timeline to be “sometime 10-20 years out” and compared Bitcoin upgrades to routine software updates, stating, “Bitcoin’s a protocol like the English language and base 10 math.”
Saylor emphasized that phishing attacks exploiting quantum fears pose greater immediate risks, noting, “if I wanted to hack your Bitcoin, I’d send you an email saying a quantum computer can hack your Bitcoin. Click on the link to upgrade now.“
Source: a16zThis divide and discovery comes as A16z recently declared that $750 billion worth of Bitcoin sits in quantum-vulnerable addresses, with the US government already preparing to transition federal systems to post-quantum cryptographic algorithms by 2035.
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