BIP 361

Bitcoin and Ethereum are moving post-quantum planning into sharper focus as U.S. support for quantum hardware expands. Developers are not treating the threat as immediate, but migration timelines are increasingly clustering around a 2029 planning horizon.

Anthropic’s Claude Mythos Preview model identified a weakness in HAWK, a proposed post-quantum digital-signature scheme not used by Bitcoin or Ethereum. The result does not affect current crypto transactions, but it underscores why developers are weighing migration paths before quantum-capable threats arrive.

Project Eleven says a new zero-knowledge proof system could let wallet owners prove control of quantum-vulnerable bitcoin without exposing seed material. The approach may support a recovery path under BIP-361, but it does not cover Satoshi-era coins generated before modern wallet derivation existed.

A proposal from Binance founder Changpeng Zhao to freeze Satoshi Nakamoto’s estimated 1.1 million bitcoin if quantum computers threaten Bitcoin’s cryptography has divided prominent industry figures. The dispute centers on whether defending the network from a future hack would justify intervention in coins long treated by markets as permanently dormant.