Quantum computers could crack cybersecurity systems before 2030

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NASA’s Artemis II mission successfully launched yesterday, carrying four astronauts who will, if all goes to plan, travel farther from Earth than any human has before. The astronauts will now orbit Earth for about 24 hours to perform checks on their spacecraft — which they’ve named Integrity — and then fire their engines to set them on course for the Moon. The voyage there will take three days, after which they will slingshot around the Moon’s far side before making the journey home. “Humanity’s next great voyage begins,” said NASA launch commentator Derrol Nail as the rocket cleared the launch tower.

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Nature correspondent Alexandra Witze will have rare access to the mission scientists during the most scientifically interesting parts of NASA’s Artemis II mission around the Moon: the flyby of the far side. Most of this area has never been directly observed by human eyes, and scientists are excited about what the astronauts will see. Follow live on nature.com as we discover along with researchers the first-hand view of this mysterious part of our nearest neighbour. Our live blog starts (barring any changes to NASA’s schedule) on Monday on Monday afternoon Houston time.

Advances in quantum computing could leave the world’s cybersecurity systems at the mercy of hackers before the end of this decade. Researchers and cybersecurity experts had long assumed that technologies that rely on encryption and authentication methods — such as credit card systems and Internet communications — wouldn’t be a serious threat for at least 10 years. Now, two research groups have drawn up new estimates for the amount of quantum computing required for cracking two types of common security technologies that greatly shorten that timeline.

Nature | 5 min read

Reference: Google preprint & arXiv preprint (not peer reviewed)

Features & opinion

The use of ‘helpful’ artificial intelligence tools in settings such as healthcare, law and education risks eroding the skills of professionals in these fields, argues data ethicist Sylvie Delacroix. There are two forms of AI-induced ‘de-skilling’ to worry about. One is individual — a person’s acuity might wane as they get used to AI assistance — and the other is collective: “an entire profession might gradually lose its capacity to question and redefine its goals, because AI systems embed assumptions about what those goals are”, she writes.

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On 25 March, a US court awarded a plaintiff $6 million after finding that the addictive properties of social media had caused her harm. But there’s no general agreement on whether social-media use actually meets the current standards for addictive disorders, says psychologist Dar Meshi. How social media affects people can vary widely depending on how and why they use it, and the incorrect use of the term ‘addiction’ could lead to everyday behaviours being pathologized. More rigorous research that investigates a possible causal relationship is needed to establish if social-media addiction is a clinical phenomenon, and the criteria that could be used to diagnose it, Meshi writes.

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An AI-powered robot experiences emotions it was not programmed to feel in the latest short story for Nature’s Futures series.

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To reduce the CO₂emissions of the aviation industry, many planes are now fitted with fuel-efficient ‘lean burn’ engines. Researchers weren’t sure how these engines affected the formation of contrails — the white plumes that aeroplanes streak across the sky, which can also have an impact on the climate by trapping heat. One team decided there was only one way to find out: chase a jet plane in a research aircraft. After such a high-octane research trip, “turbulence for normal passenger aircraft is not a problem anymore”, says climate scientist and study co-author Christiane Voigt.

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Today Leif Penguinson is also following the launch of a Moon mission. Our feathered friend has stepped back in time to join the government-industry team gathered in the Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Control Center, Florida, to watch the launch of NASA’s Apollo 11 mission. Can you find the penguin?

A hint: Leif has adopted a monochrome colour palette to blend in. Readers that start their search by looking for an orange beak should change tack.

Tomorrow and Monday are public holidays in the United Kingdom, so the answer will be in Tuesday’s e-mail, all thanks to Briefing photo editor and penguin wrangler Tom Houghton.

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Jacob Smith, associate editor, Nature Briefing

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