RIGORCHAIN: Why We Are Not Rushing Toward Post-Quantum Cryptography
RIGORCHAIN: Why We Are Not Rushing Toward Post-Quantum Cryptography
On cryptographic maturity, technological restraint, and the responsibility of building a stable monetary system
The recent discussion surrounding Ethereum’s post-quantum roadmap has brought an important question back into the spotlight: should blockchain networks begin replacing their existing cryptographic systems before quantum computers become capable of breaking them?
Ethereum researcher Justin Drake recently expressed the goal of completing Ethereum’s post-quantum transition by December 2028. This is an ambitious target for a complex, multi-layer migration involving account signatures, validator signatures, data availability, and other cryptographic components.
The discussion is important. The underlying threat deserves serious research.
But it also raises a broader question:
Does adopting newer cryptographic technology automatically make a monetary system safer?
At RIGORCHAIN, our answer is no.
We believe that security is not measured by how quickly a project adopts the newest technology. It is measured by how well the system’s rules, implementations, and security assumptions have been tested and understood.
This is why RIGORCHAIN currently uses Ed25519 and does not implement post-quantum signatures.
That decision is deliberate.
1. Acknowledging the Quantum Threat Without Exaggerating It
Quantum computing is a real field of scientific and engineering research. It is not science fiction.
A sufficiently powerful, fault-tolerant quantum computer could threaten widely used public-key cryptographic systems, including elliptic-curve signatures such as Ed25519.
This is a consequence of Shor’s algorithm, which can solve certain mathematical problems that classical computers cannot solve efficiently.
It would be incorrect to claim that Ed25519 is quantum-resistant. It is not.
It would also be incorrect to claim that the threat can never become practical.
However, there is an important distinction between a theoretical capability and a machine that can reliably perform cryptographically relevant attacks.
As of November 2026, no publicly known quantum computer can break the cryptographic systems protecting major blockchain networks.
The exact timeline for such a capability remains uncertain.
There are substantial engineering challenges involving error correction, logical qubits, circuit depth, and reliable computation. Progress in quantum computing is real, but progress does not mean that practical cryptographic attacks are already available.
A monetary system should take future risks seriously without confusing future possibilities with present-day capabilities.
2. Cryptographic Maturity Is a Security Property
Ed25519 is not a new experimental algorithm.
It has been widely studied, implemented, deployed, and reviewed across many years of real-world use.
Its engineering characteristics are well understood:
- Compact public keys and signatures.
- Efficient signing and verification.
- Mature implementations and established development practices.
- Extensive use across software systems.
- A substantial body of public cryptographic analysis.
None of these properties makes Ed25519 immune to future cryptographic advances.
But they do matter when evaluating the security of a system operating today.
Post-quantum cryptography has made important progress. NIST has standardized new algorithms, including ML-DSA and SLH-DSA.
These standards represent significant work by the cryptographic research community. They should not be dismissed.
However, standardization and long-term operational maturity are different things.
A standardized algorithm still needs to prove itself through implementation reviews, independent audits, interoperability testing, performance evaluation, and years of practical deployment.
The relevant question is not simply whether a new algorithm is designed to resist quantum attacks.
It is also whether its implementation, integration, and operational behavior are sufficiently understood for the system that intends to depend on it.
A newer cryptographic primitive may solve one class of risk while introducing other engineering risks.
A responsible security decision must consider both.
3. Changing a Signature Algorithm Is Not Just a Wallet Update
In a conventional application, replacing a cryptographic library may appear relatively straightforward.
A monetary protocol is different.
A signature scheme is part of the mechanism that establishes ownership and authorizes the movement of assets.
Changing that mechanism can affect:
- Transaction formats and validation rules.
- Public-key and signature representations.
- Wallet generation, backup, and recovery.
- Node verification logic.
- Transaction size and network resource consumption.
- Consensus compatibility between different software versions.
- Existing outputs and the ability to spend previously created funds.
A post-quantum transition is therefore not simply a matter of adding another signature option to a wallet.
It can become a protocol-level change affecting the entire network.
The engineering burden is particularly important for a monetary system that aims to maintain stable consensus rules over time.
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A security transition should not be treated as automatically safe merely because its motivation is security.
The transition itself must also be secure.
4. RIGORCHAIN Chooses Mature Technology Over Premature Migration
RIGORCHAIN currently uses Ed25519 for cryptographic ownership of spendable outputs.
We do not claim that Ed25519 is quantum-resistant.
We do not claim that quantum computing will never threaten it.
We also do not believe that every blockchain must adopt the same cryptographic roadmap.
RIGORCHAIN follows a conservative approach:
- Prefer established cryptographic primitives with substantial real-world experience.
- Avoid introducing new cryptographic dependencies without a compelling technical justification.
- Do not change consensus rules simply to follow industry trends.
- Distinguish demonstrated security requirements from speculative future requirements.
- Give long-term protocol stability serious weight when evaluating engineering decisions.
This is not a rejection of post-quantum research.
It is a decision not to turn an emerging research direction into an immediate consensus requirement without sufficient justification.
We will continue to recognize developments in cryptographic research and the evolution of relevant standards.
But following research does not mean adopting every new technology as soon as it becomes available.
5. A Monetary System Should Not Be a Technology Showcase
A blockchain can introduce new cryptographic algorithms, new execution environments, new virtual machines, and increasingly complex protocol mechanisms.
Some of these innovations may be useful.
But a monetary system has a different primary responsibility.
It must reliably preserve ownership, validate transactions, maintain a consistent monetary ledger, and allow independent participants to verify the same rules.
For such a system, stability is not an absence of engineering ambition.
It is an engineering objective in its own right.
Every additional mechanism creates implementation and maintenance responsibilities. Every protocol-level change requires careful consideration of compatibility, correctness, and unintended consequences.
There is a cost to technological complexity, even when that complexity is introduced in the name of security.
A monetary protocol should not adopt complexity merely to demonstrate that it is technologically advanced.
The purpose of cryptography is to protect the monetary system, not to provide a permanent reason to redesign it.
6. Conservative Does Not Mean Ignoring the Future
There is an important difference between refusing to prepare for a threat and refusing to make premature changes.
RIGORCHAIN does not dismiss quantum computing.
We acknowledge that sufficiently capable quantum computers could undermine current public-key signature systems.
We also recognize the value of NIST’s post-quantum standards and the research being conducted by Ethereum and other projects.
But we believe that cryptographic migration should be guided by demonstrated technical requirements, mature implementations, and a clear understanding of the consequences.
There is no benefit in pretending that an uncertain threat is already an immediate emergency.
There is also no benefit in waiting until an emergency is unavoidable before beginning serious technical evaluation.
The challenge is to distinguish responsible observation from premature adoption.
For RIGORCHAIN, that distinction is part of technical conservatism.
Our mainnet consensus rules are not an ordinary software upgrade surface. A change to a consensus invariant is not simply another routine release.
That principle is important precisely because monetary rules should not be changed casually, even when a proposed change is presented as an improvement.
7. Security, Stability, and Restraint
Different blockchain projects have different architectures, responsibilities, and engineering constraints.
Ethereum’s scale, validator architecture, and broader application ecosystem give it reasons to begin a large post-quantum research and migration program early.
RIGORCHAIN has made a different choice based on its own protocol philosophy.
We do not consider technological novelty an independent measure of progress.
We do not believe that adopting more cryptographic mechanisms automatically produces a safer monetary system.
And we do not believe that a protocol should continually change its foundations simply because new technologies become available.
For a monetary system, the most important properties are reliability, predictable rules, independent verification, and long-term stability.
A conservative approach does not guarantee that today’s technology will remain sufficient forever.
It does, however, recognize that changing the foundations of a monetary system carries risks of its own.
RIGORCHAIN chooses to follow mature technology rather than race ahead of it.
Not because the future does not matter, but because the security and stability of a monetary system matter more than being first to adopt the next technology.
Technical references
- Ethereum Foundation — Post-quantum cryptography on Ethereum
- NIST — Post-Quantum Cryptography Standards
- RIGORCHAIN — Official source code and protocol documentation
- RIGORCHAIN — Consensus Invariants
RIGORCHAIN is a proof-of-work monetary protocol. This article describes its current cryptographic design philosophy; it is not a claim that its current signature scheme provides post-quantum security.
