Code-breaking quantum algorithm run on a silicon chip
In 1994, a MIT’s computer scientist, Peter Shor affirmed that quantum computers will crack the RSA encryption algorithm and we are able to see his idea demonstrated on a silicon chip.
The chip is 26-millimetre-long and runs Shor’s algorithm in cut-down form (confirming that 3 and 5 multiply to form 15).
Factorization is an exponential problem. You can always make the code impractical to crack in realistic time by adding a few more bits. The point about quantum computing is that it allows the problem to be solved in polynomial time.
It is the first time a quantum calculation cracks data encryption on a silicon chip. Today, quantum computing is full of complex quantum circuits made of silicon and silica. The number is growing exponentially following the Moore’s law from semiconductor industry.
Coming back to RSA encryption algorithm, used in electronic commerce protocols, it becomes unstable if this chip will be produced on large scale. The algorithm involves three steps: key generation, encryption and decryption but it’s no longer a secret how to break RSA. Solving the problem takes time and today we seem to have the answer.
The chip uses light instead of electricity. It’s obvious the new chip saves time because of the photons.
One of the members of the team from Bristol, UK, says “It’s almost as simple as stamping the design out onto the chip and it is there and working”.
Andrew White, a quantum physicist at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, remarks that “It is very important to shrink the circuitry, and the Bristol group ( Jeremy O’Brien, Jonathan Matthews and Alberto Politi) has shown … that this can be done using well-established techniques from classical photonics,” but he points out that even if the chip is only 26 mm long, it has surroundings of equipment.
Currently, a security code can be broken in realtime through parallel computing architecture, cloud computing and datacenters.
