All your public keys are belong to us!

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New Scientist reports (pay per view) that it might be sooner than you think before your private data is cracked.

…the advent of quantum computers that can run a routine called Shor’s algorithm could have profound consequences. It means the most dangerous threat posed by quantum computing – the ability to break the codes that protect our banking, business and e-commerce data – is now a step nearer reality.

A blog post at New Scientist explains how the algorithm works. What’s troubling is that there are 2 teams working on the same problem, which makes me wonder if there’s an equivalent of Moores law to encryption cracking. Just how long do we have until this standard has to be scrapped?