Security News > 2023 > January > Chinese researchers: RSA is breakable. Others: Do not panic!

Recently, Chinese researchers have claimed that an existing algorithm can be used with today's quantum computers to break the RSA algorithm, which is the fundamental basis of secure internet communication.

The basic claim of the paper, published last Christmas by 24 Chinese researchers, is that they have found an algorithm that enables 2,048-bit RSA keys to be broken even with the relatively low-power quantum computers available today.

There is nothing really new in the fact that quantum computers pose a general risk to the reliability of cryptographic procedures that guarantee secure internet communications, such as RSA open-key cryptography or the Diffie-Hellman key exchange algorithm.

The Chinese researchers could only provide a theoretical answer to this question since the solution and the techniques outlined by them require a 372-qubit computer.

Though such a computer exists within the walls of IBM, the Chinese researchers did not have this machine at their disposal.

"Apparently what happened is another guy who had previously announced he was able to break traditional asymmetric encryption using classical computers but reviewers found a flaw in his algorithm and that guy had to retract his paper. But this Chinese team realized that the step that killed the whole thing could be solved by small quantum computers. So they tested and it worked."

News URL

https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2023/01/25/chinese-researchers-rsa-is-breakable-do-not-panic/