Ledger Chief Technology Officer Charles Guillemet said he disagrees with the view that only about 30% of Bitcoin is exposed to quantum-computing risk while the remaining roughly 70% is safe because it is protected by public-key hashes. Citing Glassnode data, he noted that about 30.2% of BTC has already exposed spending public keys on-chain, but argued that this figure captures only what is visible in a static on-chain state. Public keys that have not appeared on-chain may still exist in xpubs, devices, PSBT files, logs, or backups. He also said that once a Bitcoin transaction is initiated, the public key becomes visible before the transaction is confirmed. Guillemet further cited research from Google Quantum AI saying that, under a high-speed quantum computer model that does not currently exist, an attack against secp256k1 could be completed in about nine minutes. On that basis, he said hiding public keys alone cannot solve the quantum threat and that Bitcoin will ultimately need to migrate to post-quantum cryptography.
Ledger Chief Technology Officer Charles Guillemet said he does not agree with the claim that only about 30% of BTC faces quantum-computing risk, while the remaining roughly 70% is safe because public-key hashes protect it.
Glassnode’s 30.2% figure reflects only on-chain exposure
According to Glassnode data, about 30.2% of BTC has already exposed spending public keys on-chain. Guillemet said that number reflects only a static on-chain view and should not be treated as proof that the rest of Bitcoin is safe.
He said public keys that have not been exposed on-chain may still exist in xpubs, devices, PSBT files, logs, or backups. He also noted that once a Bitcoin transaction is initiated, the public key becomes visible before the transaction is confirmed.
Hiding public keys is not enough
Guillemet cited research from Google Quantum AI saying that, under a high-speed quantum computer model that does not currently exist, a related attack against secp256k1 could be carried out in about nine minutes.
Based on that, he said hiding public keys alone cannot solve the quantum risk, and Bitcoin will ultimately need to migrate to post-quantum cryptography.
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