Joshua Schmidt: 0:04

You are listening to the Audit presented by IT Audit Labs. My name is Joshua Schmidt, your co-host and producer. Today we're joined by Nick Mellum, eric Brown and our information security architect, bill Harris at IT Audit Labs. Thanks for joining us today, bill. How are you doing? I'm doing well, thank you. Can you just give us a slight background on you? I don't think we've ever really learned about about bill. I want to hear just a little bit about how you got to be an uh, information security architect.

Bill Harris: 0:28

He also has another title I'm gonna think I'm about to get one right now. What is what?

Joshua Schmidt: 0:33

is it? I think it's badass mofo that's that's it.

Bill Harris: 0:38

That's the one I just got. Um. So yeah, I got into information technology a few decades ago and really getting closer and closer to security in such an evolving field, I decided to pick up my CISSP in 2018 and I've really just been enjoying the ride and all of the innovations that are happening in the space. So I keep coming back to the security area.

Joshua Schmidt: 1:02

How did?

Bill Harris: 1:03

you meet Eric. I've known Eric since we were back in college, so we've both grown our careers together Since the Umbro shorts days.

Nick Mellem: 1:12

I was waiting to say it, you got me.

Joshua Schmidt: 1:16

So today we're talking about Quantum, bill. What have you got for us? I know we did a session on Quantum I think last year, or maybe it was a year and a half ago, but there's been some developments. So I'd love to hear about that today and what you found recently.

Bill Harris: 1:30

Yeah, you bet. So last time we talked about the theories behind quantum and then I want to bring it forward to the next, like the last couple of years or so, where quantum has seen some progress, but is it really quite there yet and what are the use cases today for quantum? Where is it going to go tomorrow and how has it evolved? What advancements have really been done in the quantum space over those last couple of years? I want to talk a little bit about that and really what 2025 is looking like for quantum.

Joshua Schmidt: 1:58

That's great. We could use some explanations around quantum, still confusing to me.

Bill Harris: 2:05

I don't know about Eric and Nick nick, but uh, yeah, confused as ever well, if you weren't confused, you're not listening hard enough, so that's okay because, um, if you're, if you're confused, and that's you're really, you're really listening to, um, to kind of how things are supposed to work.

Bill Harris: 2:17

So just a real quick refresher, uh, on kind of how this whole thing works right. So quantum really works on, works on the idea of coherence, and in quantum computing your bit can be a zero and a one at the same time until you observe it, and then it decoheres into either a zero or a one. And the way quantum computing works is that you're really trying to keep it in that quantum state for as long as possible so that you can get an accurate reading on it. And what we'll talk about here today is the different things that people are doing to get a more accurate qubit so they can get better readings on it and really drive those error rates down, because error rates are what's killing the potential of quantum computing. So much time is spent trying to correct those errors, right.

Eric Brown: 3:04

Hold on, bill. We're 30 seconds in right and this is already gone.

Nick Mellem: 3:10

We have a one and a zero, then it turns into whatever it wants.

Eric Brown: 3:13

So, nick, a buddy of mine, once had a phrase that said I can explain it to you, but I can't understand it for you. I feel Bill is doing that to us right now.

Nick Mellem: 3:25

We'll see what he has to say. I'm sure we'll understand exactly what's going on when Bill's finished with us today.

Bill Harris: 3:29

Hopefully. Well, it's not going to be a rehash of the last session, which is when I did a much deeper dive into quantum, because I don't want to just rehash the same material right, it's going to be a little bit different angle.

Joshua Schmidt: 3:40

Just to round out this part of the conversation, bill, is it kind of like the double slit experiment, where if you're shooting a particle, is it through a double slit, depending on who's observing it, or when it's observed it's either a particle or a wave.

Bill Harris: 3:54

That is exactly it. So as soon as you observe that particle, you are changing it just by the act of observing it. So it's very odd stuff. There is not a really thorough understanding of how it works, especially when you get into some of the subparticles that drive quantum. So there's a lot here that I don't understand, because there's a lot here the physicists don't understand as well.

Joshua Schmidt: 4:15

Cutting edge stuff Cool.

Bill Harris: 4:17

So today the fastest quantum machines are just about a little above about 1,000 or so qubits and they're trying to push into that 2, 2000 qubit mark. That is still nothing. Because of those high error rates, in order to really get a useful quantum computer with the error rates that we're seeing today, you're going to need somewhere probably around 20 million qubits using quantum based algorithms, right Like like Shor's algorithm, and there's a few others that you can use. If you were to get those error rates down and eliminate some of those error rates, come up with quantum readouts that you could capture much more accurately, then maybe a 20,000 qubit computer would work. And we'll talk about kind of why that mattered as far as why Microsoft was going after the Majorana particle in their quantum machine and how that factored into those error rates and getting a machine that could operate at far fewer qubits.

Bill Harris: 5:15

Really, the whole thing you'll see on the right side of the screen here. So really the whole thing is driven by a combination of governments, is driven by a combination of governments. China is a big factor in this, the United States, parts of the European Union, as well as private sectors. One of the leaders here is Atom Computer, along with IBM, google. They're all getting in there, and there's a certain ego factor here too, because even though we don't have a practical use for a quantum computer within the next several years, at least it's almost like a marquee thing for them. Right Dodge didn't need to build the Viper back in the nineties, but it really increased the cache of their name, and so it is going to be. With quantum, it's like whoever kind of gets to that first milestone and the next one, they're going to see their star rise, and so that's part of the reason.

Nick Mellem: 6:08

Bill. What's the first milestone? What are we trying to get to?

Bill Harris: 6:12

The first milestone was just building that quantum computer and having it execute a quantum operation. Now the milestones are hey, can these quantum machines solve problems? Google was one. They just they posted something that their Willow quantum computer did recently where it solved a problem that would take a classical computer several septillion years to solve. It was a useless mathematical problem, but it was still impressive. Right, it was just. They're all trying to show this quantum superiority with these very particular problems right now, but none of it is useful, outside of a few little edge cases which we're going to talk about here really shortly.

Joshua Schmidt: 6:55

So, bill, when we're talking about actual use cases for these, there's nothing really tangible being pushed to market at this point, is there? Or is it just kind of an arms race, sort of along the lines of AI or something like that?

Bill Harris: 7:10

Yeah, so there is in terms of quantum computer. No, there's nothing really tangible happening right now, with maybe one exception, and it's not a quantum computer, but it's quantum key distribution. And it's not a quantum computer but it's quantum key distribution which uses quantum mechanics to protect the exchange of security keys. So this is using the property of quantum mechanics that we just discussed, that as soon as you observe the quantum state, you're changing it. So you look at the photon, you change it, and so the way this, this, this, works is that if you've got and I think it's usually called Jane is trying to send her, you know her, her key to her public, he's going to John down a fiber optic link, that is.

Bill Harris: 8:01

That is now a quantum key, and if anyone would observe that photon on its path, they would change that photon and then Jane would immediately know that someone was snooping. So this makes interception of electronic information impossible. So this is one area where they are doing it. Today, verizon has a system like this set up in the Washington DC area, china has a system set up in their cities and South Korea also has a system set up and they're using it. So that's one good use case. But again, it's not a quantum computer per se, and they're using it.

Joshua Schmidt: 8:38

So that's one good use case. But again, it's not a quantum computer per se, but it's using the quantum theories and the quantum physics to create an extra level of security, and that's called quantum key distribution. That's right, that's right.

Bill Harris: 8:46

Yeah, the other thing that quantum computing is doing is it's driving the security people absolutely nuts right, and so they're so petrified that this is just going to break RSA encryption and the Internet's going to come the Internet's going to be all clear text here shortly that they're scrambling to get ahead of this, and so they're coming up with these really innovative encryption algorithms. Nist just approved a few based on Lattice framework. They've got their Kybers encryption algorithm that they've recently approved, along with a few others. They're also approving some new hashing algorithms that'll be quantum safe, and IBM has released for marketing a number of quantum safe encryption methods for their infrastructure. So you can buy quantum safe encryption today, and I think that's a really, really great bulwark against what's coming.

Nick Mellem: 9:38

Bill, do you think we really know that it is, in fact, quantum safe if we don't know its full potential yet or where it's going to be?

Bill Harris: 9:45

It's a, it's a good point. So I mean, I guess, because it's all theoretical, we don't have a quantum computer powerful enough to actually test it. So I think your point is spot on. The math suggests that it will be quantum safe, because the mathematics that they're using, yeah cannot quickly be solved by any type of polynomial equations, which really is where quantum excels I said like I know what I'm talking about.

Eric Brown: 10:09

You know, it's really humbling though right, because, like you know, as he goes down this path, I think to myself that often or sometimes I'll find myself in a situation where I'm rambling about some sort of security crap that most people don't care about MFA or DDoS or you know one of these other acronyms that you know we just kind of use daily and you know, the lay person just kind of glazes over on that stuff. And that's honestly what's happening here with all this quantum business. We can't observe it. It's not good enough. Yet the computers look cool At least the picture that Bill's got there, if that's a quantum computer.

Bill Harris: 10:54

Yeah, they're beautiful. So, and just a quick refresher, this over here is you know, all these little cryogenic tubes are passing refrigerant as they go down and down towards the chip at the very bottom and they're keeping that chip frozen, almost frozen really, to near absolute zero, where you achieve, finally, achieve superconductivity, and that chip exists. It's a coexistence of different types of superconductors under that extremely low temperature. The only other way to really do it would be to put it under very high pressure and then, over top of this chandelier they usually put well, they have to put a shroud to keep all the noise out, because your cell phone going by any type of magnetic interference, sound interference, it'll upset the qubits and the operations that are occurring within.

Joshua Schmidt: 11:49

For our audio-only listeners. We're looking at a chandelier-style quantum computer here that looks to be made out of precious metals, or it's very golden, and it's got probably about six or seven layers to it with lots of wires coming down. It kind of looks like a cross between a chandelier and maybe like a tech jellyfish of some sort, but um it's like some out of some out of a sci-fi movie or something one of the things that I I kind of relate it to because I'm also have a hard time making that leap into the quantum thinking and the physics.

Joshua Schmidt: 12:21

Um, but you know, we can look at a glass of water. The glass is half empty or half full. It's kind of our take or our opinion that we're bringing to a physical situation. But you know, this seems like this philosophically goes beyond materialism when we get into quantum, where there's just nothing exists except for matter and movements, but seems like there's an x factor here, with the participant involved helping create a reality, or it's just going way beyond materialistic science at this point it's the religion of quantum is what I'm hearing.

Nick Mellem: 12:57

I just want to know how long in my lifetime am I going to have a quantum chip in my iphone?

Eric Brown: 13:03

that's two years. Yeah, two years I'm sure.

Bill Harris: 13:06

Yeah, no, no, two years. Well, that's. And that's why it's like, because all really, when you, when you look at a quantum computer you just heard I gave you the size of three to five feet. The chip itself is about the size of a regular PC chip. All the stuff around it is the stuff that keeps it cold. So you don't get superconductivity, you don't get quantum unless you can keep it under very high pressure or very, very cold temperatures. As a result, everything that goes around quantum is very large and it consumes a lot of electricity to keep it at that state okay, so where is this all going, uh?

Joshua Schmidt: 13:41

I was just gonna ask that yeah, where are we at now today, bill after uh, some of the recent advancements since our last podcast on this topic so there, um.

Bill Harris: 13:50

So a couple things. First, I want to be sure that we understand where they're trying to get to and, um, one of the things I think they're doing and I'll pick out a few things is quantum AI is becoming a thing. They're also using artificial intelligence to augment quantum computing to drive the error rates down. So they're getting quantum calculations back, they're applying it to an AI algorithm and they're helping that. They're trying to use that to eliminate some of the errors and drive up the error correction improvements. You're also seeing quantum getting into the financial space. The financial space is really interesting because the banks in particular are so interested in quantum. Why is that? Because quantum does such a good job of calculating huge amounts of data and if the banks can use quantum and combine that with artificial intelligence, it can start to predict market fluctuations and that could potentially rewrite the economy in ways that we don't we really can't predict. So it's a space we should definitely watch closely there as, as this technology develops.

Nick Mellem: 15:02

Do you think anybody's thinking about like the actual need for this for the general consumer? I get it for, like you know, different areas that you brought the banks for you. I, you know, let's our kids. Kids are using this in 50 years. What is there a benefit to them to actually have that in their iPhone? Are they getting something extra? Do we even want the mainstream to have this kind of power?

Bill Harris: 15:24

No, so no one's really thinking about that right now. Just because the quantum algorithms are so limited in their function. You don't program a quantum computer, of course, like you would program a PC. You don't program it to give you 10,000 frames per second in your latest game. Its uses are just extremely focused on two particular things, and so it'll never be a replacement for a classical computer. It won't. It just can't do everything a classical computer can do. It's just there's a few things that it does extraordinarily well.

Nick Mellem: 15:57

That makes more sense when you say it that way. A classical computer can do. It's just there's a few things that it does extraordinarily well.

Eric Brown: 16:03

That makes more sense when you say it that way that it's not actually replacing what we have now. I think I remember from the first time you were on Bill you need a classical computer to control the quantum computer.

Bill Harris: 16:11

That is absolutely correct. Yes, yes, you do. The two go hand in hand. And then the data that comes out of the quantum computer is also analyzed by a classical computer.

Joshua Schmidt: 16:20

Why is that, bill? Is it just the nature of the actual physics of the quantum computers, or is there a reason that you could easily explain as to why that won't replace a classical computer?

Bill Harris: 16:33

Sure, when you think about quantum computing, think about it in terms of math, and so there might be a dozen or two dozen useful algorithms that run on the quantum computer. And these algorithms, you know something like, you know parenthesis, you know R to the power of five minus W, and you know kind of all this stuff, right, and so that's how you're just putting data into that algorithm and you're getting something out of the other end, right, and so now you can imagine how how incredibly focused this thing is. And you can't, you can't just like write a PowerShell script for it, right, right, it doesn't, it doesn't work that way at all.

Joshua Schmidt: 17:18

It's just solving very specific, mostly polynomial math math problems okay, so that's why it will be good for weather forecasting, drug development, financial modeling, um, you have a couple of other other things here to traffic optimization and, um, and the artificial intelligence. Is that what's kind of putting the guardrails onto the quantum, then, and taking the place of classical computing to kind of optimize, uh, how it's functioning?

Bill Harris: 17:45

yes. So artificial intelligence still has a little bit of a problem with dealing with huge volumes of data. This is where quantum really excels. A classical computer typically deals in exponential math. For a classical computer to go break a password that is 10 characters long, and let's say it's using 70 or so possible characters within that password, it can cycle through that password in about 2.8 quintillion operations. Ok, so that's, that's a long time. Now quantum with its polynomial math. What quantum does is it takes. It'll do that in the square root of that number. It's using quadratic equations to solve the problem. So instead of, instead of of two point eight quintillion, it's doing it in about one point eight billion operations. That is why quantum is faster. It's not faster. It doesn't go through this data because it's moving bits around. Faster, it's going through the data because it needs to do far, far fewer calculations, approximately the square root of all the calculations that a classical computer has to do.

Joshua Schmidt: 19:00

So it's not going to like turn my um audio engineering processes down to like seconds instead of minutes. For example, when I, when I produce a music track and I have to bounce out assets or a video, for example, it can take 10 minutes. You know, um so it's not going to be able to necessarily make those computer processes faster, that's's not on the horizon.

Bill Harris: 19:23

No, in order for it to do that, you'd have to find some type of an algorithm that would do that. Okay, yeah, and there the classic computer is just going to be far more practical, because, even though it's going through a lot of data, it's really not going through that much data.

Joshua Schmidt: 19:40

So I know that they've been working hard on this. In the background, we don't hear much about quantum compared to AI, for example. There's been a lot of investments made, but what have you seen come to fruition in the tech space as far as quantum goes? I know there was some recent news and I have a hard time pronouncing this it's Majorana, yep, majorana.

Bill Harris: 20:05

Majorana particle yep.

Joshua Schmidt: 20:10

Okay, and named after a physicist, I assume. But is this Microsoft kind of getting a little over their skis here and trying to roll out a PR story for some extra prep, or is this actually like something that's usable in, usable in the, in the market or will be in the near future?

Bill Harris: 20:27

okay. So, yeah, a lot's been said about this. Microsoft still has their press releases posted out there. Um, a lot of a lot of information on on the majorana qubit. The way it's important to understand.

Bill Harris: 20:40

The majorana qubit employs a different state of matter than a traditional model does. So you've got the four observable states of matter solid, liquid gas and plasma. Then beyond that you have other states of matter and then the Majorana particle uses what's called a topological state of matter. Topological state of matter, and in physics the topology refers to the ability to alter a structure, bend it, twist it. You just can't tear it apart, but you bend it and you twist it and it will maintain its molecular principles, its molecular properties. Now, the reason that's so important is because that makes this Majorana particle very resilient to noise and that reduces your error rates. So if they can do that and it's a very difficult thing to do, because now they're working with a different state of matter and they're working with this new particle and they're trying to line everything up and so what they've done is they've taken, at their superconducting level layer, they've taken aluminum and that's their superconductor and that's sandwiched in with some doped semiconductors to funnel the photons through them.

Bill Harris: 21:58

Microsoft claims that they have been able to execute some quantum operations with that, and so they've claimed that well, they've kind of gotten into the first gate of the Meyer on a particle. They're not claiming they've done all of it, but they're saying they've gotten through the first part of it. Now that has come under a lot of scrutiny and we're not so sure that they have. So scientists who are looking at this and looking at the papers have noted that the the tests that Microsoft have has performed are inconsistent with what they would expect to see from the Majorana particle. So there's a lot of doubt there, and this isn't the first time Microsoft's been challenged on something and they've had to withdraw one or two papers in the last several years, from what I understand.

Eric Brown: 22:49

So, nick, this seems to me like there's kind of these new things coming up Right, remember, when we were growing up, there was the five senses senses, right, you had touch, taste, sight, vision and smell, right. Then, somewhere along the line, they came up with umami and they invented like the sixth one, which was umami, which apparently you can only get in certain foods. Not sure, I still don't know what it is, but now what I'm hearing from Bill is that they've invented several new states, right Beyond the plasma, the liquid, the gas, the solid. So I mean, that's interesting in and of itself. It's like you could just invent stuff and call it what you want Well to be clear.

Bill Harris: 23:49

I mean, it's in Microsoft's teensy defense. Microsoft isn't claiming that they invented a topological model that already existed in physics. They're claiming that they are exploiting a topological model to enable quantum operations across the Majorana particle. And that's what scientists are saying. No, we're not quite so sure. That's really what's happening here, can you?

Eric Brown: 24:11

explain to me what umami is.

Joshua Schmidt: 24:13

Oh, I'm a little bit of a home chef. It's not a sense, it's more of a flavor, right? So there's savory, meaty, richness, salty, sweet. I don't remember all the things that your tongue can sense, but umami is supposed to be that mouth-filling kind of savory that you can't quite put your finger on. It'd probably be better described by you know when it's missing. If you had a soup that was really thin and not very satisfying, it'd be missing that umami, that richness.

Eric Brown: 24:46

It's like the quantum right it's either on or it's off. It's either there, it's missing. So it's kind of the quantum version of taste I like that.

Joshua Schmidt: 24:53

I think you're on this. That's a great way to put it. That's that'd be a cool name for a quantum computer umami you heard it here first, folks we just came up with a name for one of your cats Done Done. Stop the recording.

Nick Mellem: 25:08

If there wasn't Our work here is done. We didn't even need a quantum computer for that the six hairless cat.

Eric Brown: 25:16

Umami.

Joshua Schmidt: 25:19

Are we back to Schrodinger's cats again? Is that how?

Nick Mellem: 25:21

we came to share Umami Umami.

Joshua Schmidt: 25:23

Umami, that's right.

Bill Harris: 25:31

So I got one more thing that actually goes into philosophy a little bit here. So I want to call out something that Google uncovered and then something that NASA uncovered. So Google was doing some quantum operations. This wasn't that long ago I think it might have been last year and there's a blog on their post about it that said they got some unexpected results that they believe lend credence to the theory of parallel universes, believe lend credence to the theory of parallel universes, and they put this right out there on their blog and they wrote a bit about it, which I found really surprising. But what was even stranger was that there is this story circulating and the story itself. The first part of the story is true NASA shut down its quantum computer in February of 2024, because they got some unexpected results that they said challenge contemporary thinking. And they shut it down and, with no further comment, they began looking into it.

Eric Brown: 26:36

Well, hold on a minute. Is that like the Catholic Church shutting down science in the 1400s because the sun is no longer the center of the universe?

Bill Harris: 26:47

Well, not necessarily so what people? It might be that, but you're doing what people are doing, right? People were wondering well, what's happening here? So imaginations have really run rampant and the stories right now range from something like well, they just found some new math they're trying to resolve to, they've stumbled into some alternate reality, or they have stumbled across some type of extraterrestrial intelligence.

Eric Brown: 27:17

Yes, like the movie Contact. Remember that, tony Foster, tony Foster.

Joshua Schmidt: 27:21

Great flick.

Nick Mellem: 27:23

Yes, I had it sitting back here for like six months and I finally threw it out.

Joshua Schmidt: 27:28

Get it out, because I'm bringing it there. Here we go. Have you heard of the Mandela effect?

Nick Mellem: 27:32

The Mandela effect, I want to say yes, but go ahead, Hit us with it, josh.

Joshua Schmidt: 27:38

This has gone on like wildfire over the last probably five plus years on the internet. Have you heard of it, bill? I've where, I'm not where. Maybe it was a big. What's the? What's the particle accelerator accelerator in switzerland called? Is it the big? The large hadron collider? Yeah, yeah, the. The theory goes that cern started messing with that. We slipped into a different timeline. So there's people that remember things inaccurately. If and and nelson mandela uh dying is one of those where some people remember him passing away and then some people remember him being released from prison. Another example would be the bernstein bears. The way it's spelt, the bernstein bears or the bernstein Bears. It goes into pop culture, verbal cues like mirror, mirror on the wall from Snow White. It's actually magic mirror on the wall. So they're saying that we slipped into a different timeline at some point.

Eric Brown: 28:34

I'm going to use this in my next argument at home with my wife, right when it's like I'm constantly, I'm like yo, you're in a different dimension here.

Joshua Schmidt: 28:50

That's the best. Use right where it's like.

Bill Harris: 28:51

I'm constantly wrong, like yo you're in a different uh dimension here, so maybe that's you know lending some credence to uh to this.

Bill Harris: 28:54

So it's funny you should say that, because that's exactly kind of where some of these arguments are going is they're they're drifting off into quantum memories and the theory that you actually never really die, because at every juncture in your life you like Schrodinger's cat, you either live or you die, and so a version of yourself will live in perpetuity, as it always junctures off, and so you'll die an infinite number of times, but there's always another one of you out there in some type of an alternate universe. So it's really diving deep and I don't believe any of it, but it's just interesting thought material. You really took us there Josh.

Joshua Schmidt: 29:37

Yeah, well, hey, you know that's my job.

Nick Mellem: 29:40

I should not have thrown away that hat.

Eric Brown: 29:42

Why did they shut it down if they found something interesting?

Bill Harris: 29:46

They didn't understand the results, and so the results they got from their quantum machine did not correlate with their understanding of physics, or they just didn't like what they got back.

Eric Brown: 30:01

Now I have a question, bill, for you, maybe it's more for Josh, bring it on. Why are the aliens always probing us?

Joshua Schmidt: 30:13

Well, yeah, that's a great question. I wasn't prepared to answer that one.

Eric Brown: 30:17

Well, as a UFO enthusiast or whatever you're calling them I guess you can't call it a UFO anymore I don't know whatever it's called.

Joshua Schmidt: 30:23

Yeah, that's a great question I always joke about. If they're so intelligent, why are they always crashing and leaving stuff behind? I don't know. I think one explanation could be that there's so many different variations of them, or there might be less intelligent ones, less advanced ones, that are actually curious about our biology. There's also some wild theories out there that they can't reproduce, they can no longer reproduce or they become asexual to the point where they need to extract some sort of biological material from us or some dna to perpetuate themselves. I mean, you know, you can go as sci-fi on that as you want, uh, but uh, you know, for every crazy question there's a million quick, crazy answers. Uh, what else do you got for us, bill? In terms of like, I know that they were afraid of their results. Perhaps, maybe they were shocked by them, that they thought that they could be altering the fabric of space-time. Was that like a valid concern? That seemed to be what their focus was Absolutely yeah.

Bill Harris: 31:30

So there was some concern that one of the speculations is that they were poking at the Higgs field. You might have heard of the Higgs boson particle, which is the particle that makes up, really, the fabric of the universe. It's one of the fundamental ones and they were poking at that field. And when you do that in a manner that you don't really understand the physics surrounding it, then you begin to wonder is there a butterfly effect, right? Are you affecting something elsewhere in the world, or are you changing the trajectory of some other timeline? Absolutely crazy stuff, and I guess, if you're dealing with quantum, that we don't really fully understand. Sure, they're all valid questions, but that was indeed one of the concerns.

Eric Brown: 32:25

So it's kind of like play stupid games, win stupid prizes. We didn't know what was going on.

Bill Harris: 32:28

Yes, that's right, and that kind of stuff happens inside of a quantum computer. It's like you're not just passing electrons back and forth, you are doing some really cutting edge things and you're poking at these subatomic particles.

Nick Mellem: 32:43

Is NASA going to turn that thing back on?

Bill Harris: 32:46

Yeah, what's so weird about NASA is that they're not talking about it, and it would be so simple if they would just issue some statements, but we haven't heard.

Joshua Schmidt: 32:56

That brings up a question I had about just security ramifications, national security. I know DARPA's been involved with Quantum. I think Microsoft was one of two companies that was chosen to work with DARPA on this On a local scale and a worldwide scale. Can you think of any attack vectors this might create?

Nick Mellem: 33:14

The limits are. There's no limit.

Bill Harris: 33:16

Yeah, I would agree with that. It's probably no limit because we don't know enough. I think the potential attack vectors could vary from the technical as we understand it to the absolutely outlandish. You know when you start we were talking about it earlier. You know quantum memories and such.

Eric Brown: 33:35

It could just really go off the rails, gentlemen. I'm still working with users, trying to keep them to not store passwords in spreadsheets. Use MFA, lock your credit, right, like we're at the basic level here. So quantum, you know? Like quantum in theory of like. Oh, they may crack the SSL, the crypt Good, so what Right. Ssl decrypt Good, so what Right? Let's focus on getting our credits locked passwords into a password manager and MFA.

Nick Mellem: 34:09

It's a good question, Josh, but the thing that I can't stop thinking about is the weapons that you might build. What kind of weapons is this thing going to create? We split the atom, we got the atom bomb. What is this thing going to come up with? We're talking about getting to different timelines with our wives at home. What kind of bombs are we going to start dropping on people because of this?

Eric Brown: 34:29

If you poke that Higgs boson, it's going to poke faster.

Nick Mellem: 34:32

We might not even have any computers to hack anymore. After this thing gets done, shut it down.

Eric Brown: 34:38

Shut it down.

Nick Mellem: 34:40

It's like Chernobyl. I don't know if you are a Rick and Morty fan, you guys but a lot of this has been explored in cartoon format on that show already. The Simpsons probably has an episode about quantum computing and it's probably spot on.

Joshua Schmidt: 34:55

Everything from Schrodinger's cat to the Mandela effect, to, yeah, higgs boson.

Eric Brown: 35:00

To the Ambien effect too.

Nick Mellem: 35:03

I think we should probably just call it for today.

Joshua Schmidt: 35:06

I love this. Thank you, Bill. This has been really fun. What a wild convo today. I love it.

Nick Mellem: 35:14

I think this is what happens when you don't really know what you're talking about, right? You're just like trying to take it in and you just never know where we're going to go. That's how I feel, yes.

Bill Harris: 35:24

At least you know what's going on Bill.

Joshua Schmidt: 35:28

We'll leave it there. Thanks so much, bill, for joining us today. You've been listening to Bill Harris talk about quantum. We also have Eric Brown and Nick Mellon, as usual. My name is Joshua Schmidt, co-host and producer. You've been listening to the Audit presented by IT Audit Labs. Please like, share and subscribe. Tell a friend. We have video up on Spotify now and we're publishing every other week on YouTube with shorts in between. See you soon.

Eric Brown: 35:53

You have been listening to the Audit presented by IT Audit Labs. We are experts at assessing risk and compliance, while providing administrative and technical controls to improve our clients' data security. Our threat assessments find the soft spots before the bad guys do, identifying likelihood and impact, while our security control assessments rank the level of maturity relative to the size of your organization. Thanks to our devoted listeners and followers, as well as our producer, joshua J Schmidt, and our audio video editor, cameron Hill, you can stay up to date on the latest cybersecurity topics by giving us a like and a follow on our socials and subscribing to this podcast on Apple, spotify or wherever you source your security content.