We're playing catch-up with AI. Quantum is our chance to lead

On a pit stop to Silicon Valley to visit Apple executive chairman, Tim Cook, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese promised legislation before the end of 2026 to provide further stronger guardrails on AI – a pitch he’s taking all the way to the United Nations this week.

“Sitting on the sideline is not an option, because this is a global phenomenon that we are having,” he told reporters.

The same could be said of a far less publicised – but nonetheless urgent – global shift that is quietly unfolding in the world of science. One that threatens almost everything we know about cybersecurity, cryptography and the safety of our online data. It even has a global awareness day this Thursday, at the very time our Prime Minister will be pitching Australia as a global exemplar on digital safety at the UN.

I’m speaking of course about quantum – more specifically, quantum computing.

You could excuse the everyday Aussie for being oblivious to this looming issue. Just as the rise of AI has caught many Australians off guard, quantum appears to be following suit. By the Federal Government’s own measures, only 27% of Australians had heard of quantum technologies, according to the latest State of Australian Quantum Report 2024.

Fewer still would recall the so-called ‘AI winter’ of the 1960s, when technical roadblocks, government funding cuts and dying hype forced latent AI technology to go to ground for several decades. It is from this abyss that AI has seemingly sprung from nowhere, prompting governments worldwide to scramble for a dedicated response.

When considering quantum, the threat posed by a sufficiently powerful quantum computer is no longer merely an existential one. Cyberattack agents are currently sweeping the internet with a ‘harvest now, decrypt later’ approach, collecting as much encrypted data as possible today so they can decrypt them with future quantum computers tomorrow. In July, the Australian Signals Directorate and Australian Cyber Security Centre released new guidelines to help organisations transition to post-quantum cryptography (PQC) – with 2030 earmarked as their recommended timeframe to act.

Yet unlike the US, which introduced the US Quantum Computing Cybersecurity Preparedness Act in 2022, Australia does not yet have any federal or state legislation specifically related to governing the use of quantum technology.

If Australia’s experience with AI has taught us anything, it’s that a passive approach is a surefire way to play catchup. The difference with Australia’s response to quantum is that we still have a genuine window of opportunity to act – to not just follow other players, but to become a global leader in this space.

Decades-long research and investment has cemented Australia’s position as one of the world’s top hubs for quantum technology and innovation. But as Australia’s former Chief Scientist, Dr Cathy Foley warned earlier this year, we risk losing this legacy if the technology is merely treated as a “temporary priority or a fashionable line item”, without robust policy and legislative settings that attest to its power as a strategic economic asset.

The CSIRO predicts upwards of 19,400 local jobs in quantum, in an industry worth $6 billion – figures widely considered to be conservative given the surge in public and private global investment in quantum in the last few years.

And it’s clear that quantum readiness is about more than cybersecurity alone. Fixating on threats overlooks the significant benefits quantum technologies have the potential to bring about, from more accurate disease detection to transformative future materials.

Quantum is a field intrinsically linked to Australia’s sovereign capability, not to mention a potential boon for the local jobs market. Federal Science Minister Tim Ayers recently took to Instagram to explain the enormous benefits quantum computing could bring, including as part of the Australian Government’s Future Made in Australia scheme – referencing the future manufacturing job opportunities emerging in years to come.  

Amidst a tightening of Australia’s net overseas migration targets, with implications for the number of quantum experts joining our local workforce and universities, Australia will increasingly need to rely on its local talent pool to power these almost 20,000 quantum jobs. Yet with fewer high school students pursuing higher level maths and sciences and a decades-long decline in the number of STEM professionals, this pool will continue to dry up if we don’t shore up sustainable funding to build our local quantum workforce.      

World Quantum Readiness Day isn’t just a time to query our preparedness to respond to external threats. A more pressing question is this – can we really afford to let a ‘quantum winter’ derail the sizeable gains Australia has already made in this space?  

Professor Peter Turner is Director of Sydney Quantum Academy, a collaborative joint venture between the University of Sydney, UNSW Sydney, UTS and Macquarie University, supported by the NSW Government.