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Comment by lyu07282 | Hacker News Reader

Its interesting to imagine that somebody [1] is already now capturing encrypted internet traffic and storing it all long-term, to then hypothetically in 40-50 years or something decrypt it and draw value from that information. I suppose to blackmail future politicians, learn military secrets, whatever.

[1] NSA

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> Its interesting to imagine that somebody [1] is already now capturing encrypted internet traffic and storing it all long-term, to then hypothetically in 40-50 years or something decrypt it and draw value from that information. I suppose to blackmail future politicians, learn military secrets, whatever.

You don't have to imagine, there's literally a NSA datacenter in Utah for doing just that.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utah_Data_Center

That's exactly what I was thinking about too, but I was to lazy to find the link, thanks ;)

It's hard to tell as someone not in the field, but quantum computing seems to be moving faster than that? I'm not sure I believe two years, but:

Harvard physicists working to develop game-changing tech demonstrate 3,000 quantum-bit system capable of continuous operation

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2025/09/clearing-sign...

PsiQuantum Raises $1 Billion, Says Its Computer Will Be Ready in Two Years

https://archive.is/AEuan

As someone not in the field it's hard to distinguish the "quantum startup raised x billions, claims quantum computing x years away" from "fusion startup raised x billions, claims fusion power x years away" headlines every few months for the past 10+ years.

Headlines like these are the outliers to the trend that thus appear more credible to me personally: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45238481

Thanks for the link. I skimmed through the report that the article is based on. It tracks rising activity in quantum computing R&D in several areas. But at least in the executive summary, I didn't see anything about commercial applications one way or the other. It doesn't seem to make any predictions?

So, it's odd that the article summarized it that way.

> Overall, quantum processing units (QPUs) are making impressive progress in performance, but they remain far from meeting the requirements for running large-scale commercial applications such as chemical simulations or cryptanalysis.

Page 6 it's a quote

That's what I don't get - these folks must be more bullish than me on practical quantum computing. If you assume 20-30 years; there's no important military secrets left (what was China building in the late 90s?!) and how many politicians are in politics for that long?

> to blackmail future politicians

This seems to me the most valid reason. Any other secret is useless after 30 years.

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