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BNB Chain Tests Post-Quantum Upgrade on BSC, With TPS Down 40%

BNB Chain Tests Post-Quantum Upgrade on BSC, With TPS Down 40%

According to BNB Chain, testing on BSC found post-quantum signature data expanded by about 37 times and throughput fell 40%, indicating network scaling is needed before any mainnet deployment.

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Fact Check
All core elements of the claim are directly confirmed by the official BNB Chain source ('BSC Post-Quantum Cryptography Migration Report') and corroborated by three independent news outlets (CoinDesk, Crypto.news, CryptoBriefing) and the official @BNBChainDevs X post. Specifically: (1) ML-DSA-44 was used for transaction signatures - confirmed; (2) pqSTARK was used for consensus vote aggregation - confirmed; (3) throughput dropped by 40% - confirmed (official report cites 40-50%, with the exact TPS figures of 4,973 to 2,997 representing a ~39.7% drop, consistent with the claim's '40%' figure); (4) the security-scalability trade-off framing - explicitly confirmed by the official report. The minor discrepancy is that the official source cites a 40-50% range rather than a flat 40%, but the claim's use of '40%' accurately reflects the lower bound and the measured TPS figures. No conflicting evidence was found.
Summary

BNB Chain published an official BSC Post-Quantum Cryptography Migration Report describing tests of a post-quantum cryptography upgrade on BSC. The test replaced ECDSA transaction signatures with NIST-standard ML-DSA-44 and switched validator vote aggregation from BLS12-381 to pqSTARK. According to the report, the upgrade passed testing but reduced throughput by 40%, while signature data expanded by about 37 times. BNB Chain concluded that additional network scaling is required before any mainnet deployment, underscoring the trade-off between stronger quantum-resistant security and current network efficiency.

Terms & Concepts
  • ML-DSA-44: A NIST-standard post-quantum digital signature scheme tested by BNB Chain as a replacement for ECDSA transaction signatures.
  • pqSTARK: A post-quantum method used in the test for validator vote aggregation, replacing BLS12-381 in the consensus process.
  • ECDSA: A widely used digital signature algorithm in blockchain systems that the BSC test replaced with ML-DSA-44 during the post-quantum migration trial.