Eye Spy - May 2018

48 EYE SPY INTELLIGENCE MAGAZINE 115 2018

Bo Ewald, President of D-Wave and former chief at Los Alamos. The US site operated

the world’s most powerful Cray super computer. In 1983, Richard Feynman, an

American theoretical physicist known for his work on quantum mechanics told Ewald:

“You know, one day all of these Crays will be replaced by quantum computers.

China’s military potential will be advanced

greatly by quantum computing

One of the documents

leaked by NSA traitor Ed-

ward Snowden, contains

information on a secret

programme or operation

codenamed OTN - Owning the Net. It

reveals around $80 million has been

budgeted for the development of a

quantum computer capable of ‘owning the

net and providing the technological means

for NSA/CSS to gain access to and

securely return high value target

communications’.

The documents warn that despite the US

being a world leader in quantum

computing, other countries are catching

up, including EU states, Russia and China.

In 2017, the
Russian state
atomic energy
corporation
Rosatom, the
Foundation for
Advanced
Studies and
the Ministry of
Education and
Science
signed a joint
three-year
project on the
development
of a quantum computer. Rosatom’s nuclear
weapons research institute at the All-Russia
Research Institutes of Automatics (VNIIA) has
been charged with taking the lead in
organising the project.

A GLOBAL ENDEAVOUR

Europe too is also focusing on the creation of
its own quantum computer over the next ten
years, investing the equivalent of about a

billion dollars into its Quantum Technologies

Flagship Programme.

With the possible benefits of quantum

computing self-evident, there are multiple

players, including Russia, China, the US,

Canada, Japan, Israel and Europe - all striving

to get the upper hand, with China and the US

battling for the top spot. White House officials

admit that Washington’s superiority in

computer technology was “under siege,” and

that more investment was needed specifically

in the area of quantum technologies.

Ian Levy, from the National Cyber Security

Centre (NCSC), an agency within GCHQ,

believes perfecting quantum computing will

take 20-years to perfect. Much of this is down

to cost: “The first generation of these things

will be bloody expensive so it will be nations

that have them, without a doubt,” he said. “If a

state has invested a huge amount in a

quantum computer, the logical thing is to

attack cryptosystems.”

The good news is that not all encryption will

be broken in the quantum world: some

algorithms that do not use factorisation as

their mathematical base will remain robust.

Symmetric algorithms will still be crypto-

graphically secure, as long as their keys are

doubled in length. Inventing new algorithms

will take time, but the vetting, selection,

adoption, standardisation, and roll-out will take

even longer. This is the biggest concern.

Analysts agree that while it’s important to

keep up to date with the fast-paced develop-

ments in quantum computing, the intelligence

and defence industries can’t take their eye off

today’s threats.

NSA & QUANTUM COMPUTING

Ian Levy - NCSC

Richard Feynman

Quantum computer seminar