Hot Take on Quantum Computing

Quantum computing regulation should aim to holistically prevent competition in the space and safeguard against well-known risks

Rapid developments in a variety of scientific and engineering disciplines have brought us to the threshold of widely available quantum computing technologies. This is a likely boon for science and industry and has only been realized through decades of mainly publicly funded international collaboration research. This research community has simultaneously been able to identify specific risks that are likely to occur as this technology becomes widespread, for instance with the vulnerability of many encryption systems to quantum computing brute forcing attacks a particular point of concern. The disruptive power of quantum computing also targets global security: its potential to break existing encryption methods necessitates the rapid development and global adoption of post-quantum cryptography.

Furthermore, the societal and ethical implications of enhanced surveillance capabilities require proactive and careful legal consideration within the privacy and civil liberties framework. One challenging issue is the threat these technological developments pose to individual privacy and the facilitation of government surveillance. Policymakers may be incentivized to facilitate these both simultaneously despite their inherent incompatibility, especially with regards quantum computing technologies.

Beyond that, there is the highly foreseeable, along with capricious, risk of rapid industry concentration, choking off innovation and cementing existing oligopolistic corporate power. Quantum computing regulation therefore should aim to holistically preserve competition in this sector while safeguarding against well-known risks.

The adoption of new technologies brings both opportunities and responsibilities, with significant decision-making power resting in governments. As governments hold significant decision-making power regarding the adoption of these potent new technologies, stronger international collaboration and the establishment of a global legal framework are essential.

Quantum technology is fundamentally challenging the existing legal frameworks, forcing an urgent re-evaluation of intellectual property laws. The core conflict is stark: How do we grant patents for revolutionary quantum algorithms and hardware without stifling the open access necessary for scientific growth? This tension demands novel legal solutions to manage the delicate balance between protecting innovation and fostering shared knowledge, particularly to preempt a potentially massive wave of future patent disputes. Crucially, the world needs a strategy to ensure equitable access to these powerful new technologies, preventing the creation of a detrimental “quantum divide” between developed and developing nations.

Since quantum technologies are rapidly advancing, future applications and innovations must adhere to existing legislation on data protection, governance, and privacy. However, it remains uncertain how effectively current regulatory frameworks will manage these powerful new capabilities. As these technologies mature, we must ensure that new legislation achieves several critical goals:

• It should foster open datasets and transparency while simultaneously improving privacy and comprehensibility.
• It must safeguard individual rights by guaranteeing equal access to the technologies, actively preventing discriminatory practices, and upholding core democratic principles.
• This alignment with democratic values includes promoting the European Union’s pillars of freedom, democracy, equality, and the rule of law, thereby supporting peace and stability globally.

The quantum computing sector has many aspects that mirror the AI sector

• Large capital requirements
• Returns to scale
• Risks that can upend previous safeguards
• Overall jeopardy of hype

Analogies between the quantum computing and AI sectors are abundant, and for good reason – they share many structural similarities. Both have large capital requirements. Both have powerful returns to scale. Many of the same firms are already active in both spaces for precisely these reasons. They even present risks that can upend previously erected technological safeguards.

Quantum computing, however, is well positioned to avoid the same pitfalls that have led to massive regulatory capture and concentration in the AI space.

We have demonstrably failed to avoid rapid concentration in the AI space. Microsoft, Google, and Amazon overwhelmingly control the market. Even the extremely unprofitable but large “startups” in this space such as OpenAI and Anthropic are owned in large part by these tech giants and are dependent on them for additional capital and computing resources to continue as going concerns. That this concentration has occurred with very little demonstration of value is indicative of just how much innovation has been choked off. This must be avoided in the quantum computing arena, albeit the quantum dominos already seems to be similarly falling.

We are nevertheless at an arguably healthier starting point in quantum computing for a few reasons. The aforementioned large percentage of investment coming from public coffers puts governments in a better position to provide access to these systems on equal terms to both startups and incumbents. Public ownership of patents can also allow challengers to spring up with little concern for frivolous lawsuits from private entities hoping to use their deeper pockets to remove other players from the field.

Since quantum computing methods have been mathematically modeled for decades, we are also entering into this age well prepared to anticipate how the vulnerability of traditional computing systems will manifest and how to circumvent those issues. This stands in stark contrast to today’s large generative models, which would have seemed like science fiction even a decade ago.

Prior to the likely concentration of the space, regulators should take aim at likely chokepoints that can develop

• Relatively high public investment
• Well known risks that have been anticipated for decades

Preserving and accelerating innovation in quantum computing requires regulators to consider several preemptive steps. First among them are creating size-gated regulations like those seen in the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA). This ensures that costly but necessary compliance mechanisms would only apply once a company has reached a certain scale, smoothing the ramp for startups while ensuring that the riskiest platforms are being responsible actors.

More radically, we propose treating quantum computing platforms like utility companies. That is, mandating access to other companies, even competitors, with regulated profit margins or prices like electricity or broadband. This would ensure that challengers can continue to emerge and that complacent platforms will find themselves relegated to the low growth part of the sector. It should go without saying that this would have to be coupled with much more robust antitrust enforcement than we have seen in the past.

• Treating quantum computing operators as utilities
  • Mandating profit margins
  • Mandating access
• Strict merger guidelines
• Size-gated regulations a la the DMA

These suggestions may seem extreme to some. And of course, it’s unclear if these precise recommendations are the right ones. However, four decades of Chicago School-style, comatose antitrust enforcement has brought only ever-decreasing productivity growth, wealth concentration, and erosion of democracy. We can take aim at many of the causes of these issues in this emerging sector. The future demands it.