Crypto Firms Launch Quantum Alliance as 6 Million Bitcoin Sit Exposed

In brief

• Nine blockchain organizations launched the Quantum Alliance, an open standards body to define what “quantum-ready” means and create a common way to test and verify quantum-resistance claims across networks, wallets and infrastructure.
• The group warns that elliptic-curve signatures leave roughly 6.04 million BTC (~30% of supply) quantum-exposed, citing forecasts pointing toward the late 2020s.
• Modeled on the IETF, it will work in four groups—migration, zero-knowledge systems, wallet security and cross-chain compatibility.

A group of crypto companies is trying to settle one of the industry’s murkiest questions: what it actually means for a blockchain network to be safe from quantum computers.

Executives from nine organizations launched the Quantum Alliance on Thursday, an open standards body that will set criteria for judging quantum-resistance claims and create compatibility rules for networks as they migrate to new cryptography.

The founding contributors span base-layer protocols, privacy networks, rollups, hardware wallets and security auditing, including Quantus, Postquant Labs, Midnight Foundation, Keystone, Abelian and security firm Hacken.

Modeled on the Internet Engineering Task Force, the Alliance said proposals will advance on public evidence and working implementations rather than corporate size or token holdings, and everything it produces will be published openly.