A Google quantum researcher has picked apart Project Eleven's 1 Bitcoin (BTC) Q-Day Prize, arguing the winning 15-bit attack proves far less than advertised.
Q-Day Prize Critique
In an Apr. 25 blog post, Craig Gidney, a research scientist on Google's quantum team, wrote that the contest was structured around a benchmark current quantum computers cannot meaningfully measure.
Project Eleven had awarded the bounty a day earlier to Giancarlo Lelli for deriving a 15-bit elliptic curve private key on cloud-accessible hardware, calling it a 512x jump from a prior 6-bit demonstration.
The group linked the result to long-term security assumptions behind Bitcoin, Ethereum (ETH), and more than $2.5 trillion in ECC-secured digital assets.
Gidney said he had declined an invitation to participate last year, viewing the premise as flawed. He noted that Shor's algorithm requires quantum error correction for cryptographically meaningful instances, and current machines hit roughly one error per thousand gates against billions required.
A more damaging objection followed. Gidney pointed to work by GitHub user Yuval Adam, who reportedly swapped the quantum calls with random calls and got results indistinguishable from the original.
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Project Eleven Response
Project Eleven CEO Alex Pruden defended the broader aim, saying resource requirements for such attacks keep dropping. He later acknowledged on X that small factoring problems are an imperfect yardstick for Q-Day, inviting feedback on better benchmarks.
The group cites recent estimates putting a full 256-bit attack at under 500,000 physical qubits, with a Caltech and Oratomic paper going as low as 10,000 qubits.
Gidney did not dismiss quantum risk, citing post-quantum migration work at Google and Cloudflare. The crypto industry has spent the past year debating defensive options, including Quantum Safe Bitcoin, Lightning Labs proposals, and BIP-361, which contemplates freezing roughly 6.9 million BTC sitting in wallets with exposed public keys.
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