Eventually with quantum computing we will be able to recover those wallets right? (Technically)

tigereyeTO a day ago | parent | next [-]

That depends on whether the public key has been exposed.

Bitcoin addresses encode the ripemd160 hash of the public key, so by default when payments are made to new addresses they are not quantum crackable.

But when someone spends from an address they publish the public key to the chain as part of the spend. From then on, any new deposits sent to the same address are at risk of quantum attack

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briansm a day ago | parent [-]

The hash is merely a convenience, the _actual_ public key used in transactions is present in the ledger and available to anybody who wants it.

	▲	andrewla a day ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Only if there has been an outgoing transaction from that account. If the address has only received deposits then only the hash is available.
	▲	notpushkin a day ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		How does that work? Suppose I make a paper wallet on an offline PC, write down the address and discard both keys. If I now send some BTC to this address, how does the client figure out the public key?

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thih9 a day ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Technically it might be more profitable to mine extraterrestrial diamonds.

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rbreve a day ago | parent | prev [-]

at this point bitcoin will be worthless