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Quantum computers powerful enough to break some of today’s encryption don’t exist yet. But the U.S. government is already preparing for that possibility.
On October 1, the National Security Agency (NSA) announced plans to protect national security systems from future quantum computing threats. Beginning in 2027, new commercial systems used for national security must support encryption that can withstand attacks from quantum computers. The government also plans to phase out older systems that can’t support the technology by 2030.
And a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report found that none of the 24 federal agencies it reviewed had fully completed three key preparations for the transition, including identifying vulnerable systems, estimating costs, and testing new technology.
So why start preparing now if the threat is still years away?
Cybersecurity experts said there are two reasons. Attackers can steal encrypted information today and try to unlock it later. And replacing the encryption that protects that information could take years.
Why the quantum threat matters now
Quantum computers work differently from the computers we use today. In the future, they could become powerful enough to break some of the encryption that protects online communications, financial transactions, and government information.
The biggest concern is public-key cryptography, which helps computers create secure connections and confirm identities. Other types of encryption face much less risk.
Nobody knows when quantum computers will become powerful enough to break vulnerable encryption, although the GAO said some experts believe it could happen as soon as the 2030s.
Mike Wilkes, enterprise chief information security officer at Aikido Security, said organizations shouldn’t focus too much on predicting that date, sometimes called Q-Day.
“Q-Day is the wrong planning metric,” he told Techopedia. “The important date is the point at which the remaining lifetime of your vulnerable systems and data becomes longer than the time you have left to migrate them.”
Chris Hickman, chief security officer at Keyfactor, agreed that organizations need to focus on the time required to make the transition. Even identifying all the places where they use vulnerable encryption can take months longer than expected.
Hackers can steal encrypted data now and unlock it later
“The prevailing threat today is harvest-now, decrypt-later, or steal-now, decrypt-later attacks, where adversaries are stealing data in an encrypted form for decryption later,” Hickman told Techopedia. “Even though a quantum computer is not available today that can decrypt that data, the action of stealing it is still happening today.”
This creates a problem for organizations that need to keep information confidential for many years.
“Data that must stay confidential for years is already at risk,” Sayali Patil, founder and CEO of IntentOps, told Techopedia. She explained that attackers could steal encrypted information today and use quantum computers to unlock it years later, exposing sensitive information before organizations have time to update their security systems.
And attackers don’t need powerful quantum computers to start preparing for future attacks, said Allan Dabre, senior manager of technology compliance and AI risk at PwC. They can collect encrypted information now, store it for years, and wait until the technology becomes available to decrypt it.
“So the real question isn’t when quantum arrives. It’s how long your data needs to stay secret,” he told Techopedia. “Health records, state secrets, merger plans, trade secrets. If any of it must stay confidential for ten years, and your current encryption won’t survive the decade, you’re exposed right now. The clock started when the data was encrypted, not when the quantum computer ships.”
Organizations need to prepare now because sensitive information could remain at risk for years, and replacing encryption across large, interconnected systems takes time and careful planning, Rob Gregory, chief information security officer at Optiv, told Techopedia.
Wilkes said the threat isn’t just about exposing confidential information. Powerful quantum computers could also weaken the security tools that organizations use to verify identities and determine who they can trust. Attackers could use those weaknesses to create fake credentials that look real and pretend to be legitimate users or systems.
“The quantum threat is ultimately a threat to digital trust,” Wilkes said.
New encryption standards are already available
Organizations don’t have to wait for powerful quantum computers to arrive before they start protecting their systems.
In August 2024, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) finalized its first three post-quantum cryptography standards, designed to protect information from attacks by today’s computers and future quantum computers.
One of the standards, ML-KEM, helps computers establish secure connections and exchange encryption keys. The other two, ML-DSA and SLH-DSA, protect digital signatures, which organizations use to verify identities and ensure information hasn’t been changed.
Mudita Khurana, a staff security engineer at Airbnb, told Techopedia that companies should start by finding out which applications and systems use older encryption methods, especially RSA and elliptic-curve cryptography.
“Companies should identify which applications use it, what data it protects, who owns the system, and if the underlying product can support the new standards,” she said. “They can then test them on a small number of high-risk systems and check compatibility, performance, and recovery before expanding further.”
Gregory said organizations should also check whether their hardware and software can support the new standards. They may need to update some systems and replace others.
Why replacing encryption is so difficult
Wilkes said large companies often have a harder time replacing encryption because they use it in so many different systems. These include applications, network equipment, and payment systems. Some also rely on older technology or products from outside vendors.
Banks and other financial institutions face even more challenges. They depend on mainframes, ATMs, payment networks, and older applications that aren’t always easy to update, he said.
Wilkes said that even if a company adds quantum-resistant encryption to its website, other systems that connect to it might still use older encryption methods. Those connections could remain vulnerable until those companies update them.
“There is no easy button in AWS to tick a box and turn this on everywhere,” he said. “Development teams have heavy lifting to do to get their scripts and software connectors upgraded.”
Khurana said that changing encryption in one system can cause problems with other applications, devices, and systems that connect to it. If they don’t support the new encryption, they may not work together.
Hickman said companies can’t just replace one type of encryption and expect everything to keep working. They need to make changes carefully to avoid problems with other systems or prevent people from accessing information. The process could take years, so companies need to plan ahead.
Some companies are already making progress
Although federal agencies still have a lot of work to do, some technology companies have already started using quantum-resistant encryption.
Google has added this protection to Chrome to help secure connections with websites that support the technology. Apple has also introduced quantum-resistant encryption for iMessage and other network connections.
Serhii Nikolaichuk, founder and CEO of The Capital Index, also found signs of progress on government and business websites.
On October 7, 2026, he tested 42 popular websites and discovered that 30 supported both existing encryption and newer quantum-resistant methods. These included government websites, such as nist.gov, cisa.gov, nsa.gov, and defense.gov, and banks, such as Bank of America and Wells Fargo.
Nikolaichuk told Techopedia that companies can often start using quantum-resistant encryption for website connections fairly quickly. But other changes will take much longer.
“Key exchange can be fixed with a configuration change today. Signatures, certificates and hardware will take years,” he said.
Hickman said banks, telecommunications companies, and government agencies are making progress. He also said healthcare companies, life sciences companies, and manufacturers of connected devices are showing more interest in quantum-resistant encryption.
Preparing for a threat that hasn’t arrived
The NSA’s new requirements show that the federal government is preparing for the quantum threat. But the GAO’s report shows that many federal agencies still have a lot of work to do.
Businesses face many of the same challenges.
Wilkes said companies should start by finding out where they use encryption that could be vulnerable to quantum attacks. They also need to identify which information must remain protected for years and which systems will be the hardest to update.
He also said that organizations should ask their vendors about their plans to support quantum-resistant encryption. Khurana also recommended testing the new protections on a few important systems before introducing them more widely.
“Organizations need to approach the PQC [post-quantum cryptography] migration as a multiyear program, rather than a one-time project,” Hickman said.
