Falcon-1024 live on Algorand MainNet since v5.0.0, post-quantum VRF candidate under analysis with paper due early 2027
Covered by 3 sources
The Algorand Foundation has detailed the current state of its post-quantum cryptography work. Native post-quantum accounts using Falcon-1024 are live on MainNet, supported in SDKs, AlgoKit, and Pera Wallet since the v5.0.0 upgrade. The next component to be addressed is the verifiable random function used for committee selection in Pure Proof-of-Stake consensus. A candidate construction is under security and efficiency analysis, with a research paper expected in early 2027. Consensus signatures remain as the final piece, with consensus-layer quantum resilience targeted for the end of 2027.
The protocol has been building toward quantum resilience since 2022. The current VRF relies on elliptic-curve cryptography, which NIST proposes to deprecate after 2030 and disallow after 2035. The Foundation noted that Google's quantum team cited Algorand as a real-world example of post-quantum cryptography on a live blockchain. The Foundation explained that early preparation matters even if Q-Day, the point at which quantum computers break widely used public-key schemes, is still years away, because encrypted data can be stored for later decryption.
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