My final talk while working for Sonatype on quantum computing at Devoxx Greece is up!

Wow! What a wild couple of months it’s been! As previously mentioned, when this talk was performed I was working for Sonatype and now I’m very happy as a Platform Security Engineer at Trustpilot!

I actually think this was my best talk so far. Which looking back on it makes it bitter sweet. I think the earlier “yaknow-mageddon” was finally gone and I delivered it well. Well, as long as we don’t dwell too much on the phrase “very hugely” being used! People certainly asked me a lot of questions afterwards and it wasn’t quite full, but pretty well attended, as my view while speaking below shows.

For a fair few years I’ve been deeply interested in quantum computing and quantum resistant cryptography. I’m not an expert but I’ve dabbled with IBM’s QISKIT SDK. I also researched quantum cryptography as my end of module dissertation, when studying under Professor Bill Buchannan at Edinburgh Napier for my Postgrad Certificate in Advanced Security and Digital Forensics. I honestly believe that if it does indeed take off, then the world WILL be very exciting! However it’s no sure bet. For a start we need to resolve P vs NP, to assume that we understand class complexity, in particular quantum class complexity correctly!

One book on the subject I have come back to time and time again is Quantum Computing Since Democritus by Scott Aaronson. I strongly recommend it as a published version of his lectures on the subject. It allows you to think differently about qubits, delivering a very complex subject, but with humour along the way.

Recently I’ve also been following the NIST Quantum Resistant Cryptography Algorithms proceedings too. This is a very interesting space where, should P vs NP, and therefore our understanding of quantum improvements within exponential and polynomial time be true, then we will need to get rid of all of our current cryptography techniques such as RSA and ECC which rely on the exact kind of problems quantum computers can help with (most of us believe anyhow). The NIST research has been putting these efforts to the test so, should this happen, we are in a good place before quantum computers become mainstream.

I spend the first 10 minutes explaining about classical complexity, moving to P vs NP, and joke how Donald Knuth might have ruined it all! We then look at randomness and finally a small part at the end actually on quantum computers and cryptography!

Sadly 30 minutes wasn’t enough time to deliver all I needed to and we did need to start in the classical world for the later parts to make sense! Anyhow, I loved it and if I thoroughly recommend Devoxx Greece as a conference to go to! It was their first as a Devoxx and I think it’s here to stay for sure!

I particularly loved the part at the end when even if it didn’t achieve everything it was meant to, people thought it was “fucking awesome” and as if they’d just taken drugs! I‘m proud of that!