Overview
- StarkWare’s Quantum‑Safe Bitcoin (QSB) transaction was mined on Aug. 26, 2026, and the on‑chain txid shows Bitcoin’s current consensus rules accept the construction.
- QSB replaces elliptic‑curve signatures with Lamport‑style, hash‑based locks that use RIPEMD‑160 and a signature‑grinding search to produce a valid spend without exposing a private key.
- Creating a QSB spend requires intensive off‑chain GPU work that developers estimate at roughly $75–$150 per transaction and the search can take hours on cloud hardware.
- The transaction used a nonstandard script that ordinary nodes will not relay, so StarkWare submitted it directly to a miner via MARA’s Slipstream service, limiting immediate user access.
- Full network protections still depend on protocol‑level work such as SHRINCS and BIP‑360, and next steps are independent audits, reproducibility tests, wallet lifecycle tools, and broader developer review.