The race to make blockchains quantum-resistant is shaping into a test of governance, and decentralized networks may be at a disadvantage.
Quantum upgrades don’t stop at protocol-level changes. For major networks, they require wallet-level migration across millions of users, making coordination the bottleneck.
“The hard part is not changing the node itself, it’s having the wallets do the same,” said Yoon Auh, founder of BOLT Technologies, adding that each asset holder would need to migrate and do so in a coordinated way.
“If you go talk to Bitcoin or Ethereum, it’s a bit more perplexing because of the really decentralized and kind of ad hoc participation. It seems like whenever I hear about it, it’s more like herding cats.”
A sufficiently powerful quantum computer could theoretically break the public-key cryptography that underpins digital signatures and secure communications, threatening both blockchain wallets and core financial infrastructure.
Post-quantum cryptography (PQC) is the proposed countermeasure, and the transition is already underway. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has urged organizations to begin preparing for “harvest now, decrypt later” threats, while US policy sets 2035 as the target for completing migration across federal systems.
The European Union is pushing high-risk systems to transition by 2030. Source: European Commission
Institutional governance is accelerating quantum upgrades
One place coordination may be easier is in institutional blockchain networks, where governance is tighter and the chain of authority is clearer.
Auh’s BOLT Technologies is running a pilot with the Canton Network to test a system that allows institutions to use and switch between multiple cryptographic signature schemes. Canton describes itself as an open blockchain for regulated institutions, designed to let participants exchange data and value without giving up privacy or control.
Canton is the leading network for recordkeeping of RWA tokens. Source: RWA.xyz
In regulated financial markets, infrastructure changes must meet internal controls, risk management standards,…
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