“It’s Quite a Shock”: The Quantum Deadline Is Real

In this World Quantum Day special edition of This Week in NET, host João Tomé is joined by Bas Westerbaan (Principal Research Engineer) and Sharon Goldberg (Senior Director, Product) to explain why the timeline for post-quantum cryptography may be arriving sooner than expected. Recent research suggests the number of qubits required to break today’s encryption could fall dramatically, accelerating the urgency for companies and the Internet ecosystem to migrate to post-quantum security. Google has set a 2029 migration target, and Cloudflare is working toward a similar timeline. Bas, who has spent years deploying post-quantum cryptography at Cloudflare, explains why the shift from theoretical risk to practical planning is happening now, what “Q-Day” would actually mean, and why upgrading the Internet’s cryptography is one of the largest coordinated security transitions ever attempted. The episode also covers the difference between post-quantum encryption and authentication, how quantum computers work, and what organisations should start doing today to prepare. Check the Cloudflare Blog: blog.cloudflare.com/post-quantum-roadmap Timestamps 0:00 — Cold open: “It’s quite a shock” 0:40 — World Quantum Day and why this matters now 2:30 — Sharon Goldberg: the big picture of post-quantum cryptography 4:20 — Why Cloudflare is targeting 2029 7:00 — Encryption vs authentication and the “harvest now, decrypt later” risk 10:50 — Bas Westerbaan: background and path into cryptography 18:30 — How quantum computers actually work 23:40 — Why RSA and elliptic-curve cryptography are vulnerable 28:10 — Why the quantum timeline may be accelerating 33:00 — Cloudflare’s post-quantum deployment progress 40:20 — How AI could help the industry migrate faster 48:10 — What companies should start doing today 58:00 — Quick-fire round and the Internet in a post-quantum world