Serious Risk Within 5–15 Years
Quantum security is no longer a distant technical concern. It is becoming a business risk.
A 2024 expert survey asked how soon a quantum computer could break today’s widely used encryption. Even the cautious forecast passes a 50% likelihood within 15 years. The more optimistic forecast sees serious risk much sooner.
That matters because encryption sits underneath almost everything: banking, payments, cloud systems, identity, healthcare, insurance, government records, and confidential business data.
The danger is not only what happens when a powerful quantum computer arrives. The danger is what can be stolen now and decrypted later. This is known as harvest now, decrypt later. Sensitive information collected today may still be valuable in 10, 15, or 20 years. That includes financial records, customer data, intellectual property, legal agreements, and critical infrastructure information.
The New York Times has described this as “the race to save our secrets from the computers of the future.” Forbes has called post-quantum cryptography a new measure of speed and agility.
The message is clear: waiting is not a strategy.
Organizations do not need to solve quantum computing overnight. But they do need to know where their cryptography lives, what data needs long-term protection, and how quickly they can move when standards, vendors, and regulators demand change.
Quantum security is not about understanding quantum physics.
It is about protecting trust.
The serious risk window is now close enough to plan for — and too important to ignore.
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