Google’s ‘Willow’ Chip Breakthrough Sparks Crypto Security Conversations
Google’s Quantum AI division has revealed a new quantum computing chip, dubbed Willow, that it claims can tackle a complex calculation in under five minutes—an endeavor that would supposedly take one of the world’s most advanced supercomputers approximately 10 septillion years.
Hartmut Neven, who leads Google’s Quantum AI team, outlined the achievement in a December 9 blog post. According to Neven, Willow not only runs certain computations at breathtaking speeds, it also manages to exponentially reduce errors as its scale increases. He stressed that a task of this magnitude far surpasses known cosmic timescales, vastly exceeding the age of the universe.
“This mind-boggling number exceeds known timescales in physics and vastly exceeds the age of the universe,” Neven wrote. “It lends credence to the notion that quantum computation occurs in many parallel universes, in line with the idea that we live in a multiverse, a prediction first made by David Deutsch.”
Beyond speed, Willow’s second breakthrough lies in its capacity to cut errors down dramatically as more qubits—a fundamental unit of quantum information—are added. Historically, adding qubits introduced more opportunities for mistakes, making it difficult to scale quantum processors for real-world applications. Neven’s team, however, claims to have cracked a “key challenge” in quantum error correction, a milestone that researchers have pursued for nearly three decades.
“Using our latest advances in quantum error correction, we were able to cut the error rate in half,” Neven said. “In other words, we achieved an exponential reduction in the error rate. This historic accomplishment is known in the field as ‘below threshold’—being able to drive errors down while scaling up the number of qubits.”
This matters because a reliable, large-scale quantum computer hinges on keeping error rates manageable. Excessive errors can produce faulty results, undermining the very promise of quantum computing for tasks like drug discovery, fusion energy simulations, and next-generation battery design.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai underscored Willow’s significance in a December 9 statement on X (formerly Twitter), framing it as a vital step in the company’s broader quest to build a practical quantum computer. According to Google’s roadmap, the company has now reached the second of six planned milestones, hitting this mark in 2023.
Implications for Cryptography and Crypto
Ever since quantum computing emerged as a field, its potential to break contemporary encryption methods has stirred concern throughout the crypto industry. If a quantum machine can decode encryption at lightning speed, it could theoretically expose vast amounts of digital assets. Yet not everyone believes today’s developments are a direct threat to cryptocurrencies.
Kevin Rose, a tech entrepreneur and former senior product manager at Google, commented in a December 9 statement on X that Willow is still nowhere near the capabilities needed to compromise Bitcoin’s encryption. Rose suggested it might take around 13 million qubits to break Bitcoin within a 24-hour period. Willow, by comparison, currently operates with just 105 qubits.
David Marcus, CEO of payment platform Lightspark, emphasized that the significance of Google’s breakthrough may not be fully appreciated yet. From his perspective, the push for post-quantum cryptography must accelerate to safeguard digital security.
These concerns have long been on the radar of Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin. In March, he noted on X that should quantum attacks become a real threat, Ethereum could mitigate the risk with a relatively simple hard fork. While users would need to update their wallet software, Buterin argued that few would actually lose funds in the process.
As quantum computing strides forward, the race to reinforce encryption and adapt digital infrastructure is heating up. Google’s Willow chip may stand as a historic benchmark—one that signals both how far we’ve come and how much adaptation the crypto world may still need to ensure its future security.