Sui announced new measures to prepare its blockchain for a quantum computing-dominated world. The project announced two signature protocols that can be implemented transparently for users with a seamless transition while maintaining already existing recovery phrases and addresses.
Key Takeaways
Sui is adding quantum-resistant signatures to protect user accounts and vaults from future quantum threats.Users can seamlessly upgrade without changing addresses or moving assets, reducing user friction and cost.Sui plans to roll out quantum-safe vaults by year-end, preempting NIST’s 2030 cryptography deprecation.SUI’s quantum strategy has a different approach for native accounts and quantum vaults, adopting two National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) approved schemes. For the former, Sui proposes ML-DSA-65 in Level three, which is being used by Chrome and Cloudflare to protect web traffic. SLH-DSA-SHA2-128s, a hash-based signature scheme, will be applied for smart contract vaults holding high-value assets, ensuring compatibility with post-quantum standards adopted by other financial networks.
The transition to these new signature schemes will be opt-in but seamless, with users conserving the same seed phrases using a new derivation path. Deposit addresses would remain the same, facilitating the adoption of these measures by reducing user involvement.
The key for this upgrade path is Address Aliases, which allow updating authorization keys to post-quantum while holding addresses and assets in place. “No forced migration, no expensive transfer of everything an account holds,” Sui stressed.
ML-DSA-65 accounts are expected to enter testnet by year-end, while full authentication using these signatures might come to mainnet by Q1 2027. Similarly, quantum-safe vaults will be introduced into Sui’s mainnet before year-end.
Sui’s move comes as the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has proposed a quantum transition timeline that recommends deprecating traditional cryptography (the one used for cryptocurrency) by 2030 and disallowing it by 2035 in favor of quantum-resistant signatures.
