Cardano Founder Disputes Bitcoin's Quantum Solution, Claims It Won't Protect Satoshi's Coins

Recently, Bitcoin's core developers proposed a solution to protect the network from quantum attacks by freezing 8 million coins. However, Charles Hoskinson, the founder of Cardano, expressed his disagreement with this proposal in a video posted on his YouTube channel. He believes that the proposed solution, BIP-361, is not only mislabeled as a soft fork but also incapable of safeguarding the network's oldest coins, including those attributed to Satoshi Nakamoto. According to Hoskinson, BIP-361 would functionally require a hard fork because it invalidates existing signature schemes. He emphasized that to implement this solution, a hard fork is necessary, which is a significant distinction given Bitcoin's historical opposition to hard forks. A hard fork changes the rules so fundamentally that old software stops working entirely, and the network splits unless everyone upgrades. The BIP-361 proposal suggests that users with frozen quantum-vulnerable funds could reclaim them by constructing a zero-knowledge proof tied to their BIP-39 seed phrase. However, Hoskinson argued that this approach cannot rescue approximately 1.7 million bitcoin that predate BIP-39's introduction in 2013, including the roughly 1 million coins associated with Satoshi's early mining activity. These early coins were generated using a different key derivation method from the original Bitcoin wallet software. If the proposal passes in its current form, those coins would remain permanently frozen regardless of whether their original owners ever attempt to migrate. Jameson Lopp, the core developer who co-authored BIP-361, acknowledged that he does not like the proposal and hopes it never needs to be adopted. Hoskinson's broader critique extends beyond the technical details, arguing that Bitcoin's lack of formal on-chain governance leaves the network unable to resolve these tradeoffs through a structured process.