PANews reported on September 24 that according to CoinDesk, StarkWare said that the estimated GPU computing cost required to prepare a quantum-safe Bitcoin transaction has been reduced from approximately US$320 to US$66 (a cost reduction of approximately 79%). Previously, the relevant transaction was mined on the Bitcoin network in August. The preparation process used about 100 GPUs and accumulated about 3,100 hours of calculation time. The $320 only refers to the calculation cost before the transaction is put on the chain, excluding the Bitcoin network handling fee.
However, the $66 is still only an estimate based on test results, and the optimized code has not yet been verified in another actually mined Bitcoin transaction. The relevant scheme is designed to deal with the risk that future quantum computers may derive private keys through public keys and steal Bitcoins. It can be used as an emergency measure before Bitcoin implements a more comprehensive quantum security solution. However, there are still limitations, including that relevant transactions must be sent directly to miners, cannot be propagated normally through the Bitcoin network, and cannot protect wallets whose public keys have been exposed.