Standardisation of and Migration to Post-Quantum Cryptography

Seyi Oladimeji, Axel Egon, Peter Broklyn

Shruti Jindal, Suman Sangwan

Bini P B

The prospect of cryptographically relevant quantum computers threatens public-key primitives underpinning modern digital infrastructure, including RSA, Diffie-Hellman, and elliptic-curve cryptography. Post-quantum cryptography (PQC) responds with algorithms believed to be hard for both classical and quantum adversaries. In August 2024, the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) finalised the first three PQC standards: FIPS 203 (ML-KEM, based on Kyber), FIPS 204 (ML-DSA, based on Dilithium), and FIPS 205 (SLH-DSA, based on SPHINCS+). This paper surveys the algorithmic families behind these standards, the harvest-now-decrypt-later threat model, hybrid migration strategies, performance trade-offs, and the engineering challenges of transitioning the global cryptographic stack. We examine deployment progress in TLS, SSH, X.509, and constrained devices, and outline open research questions on side-channel security, falcon-style signatures, and the long-term replacement schedule for classical asymmetric cryptography.

Syed Ismail Abdul Lathif, Priya Saxena, Priyanshi Singh

Kunal Das, Arindam Sadhu

Sajeevkrishnan M. A, Arifa P

Abstract Quantum computing threatens the public-key cryptography on which contemporary digital infrastructure depends, and the practical question has shifted from whether that threat will materialise to how quickly organisations are obliged to respond. Two developments drove this shift: the United States National Institute of Standards and Technology published its first post-quantum cryptographic standards in August 2024, and in June 2026 an executive order attached binding dates to their adoption across federal systems and federal contractors. This review examines those developments through targeted retrieval of primary standards and policy documents, together with peer-reviewed cryptanalytic and resource-estimation literature, with bibliographic details verified against publisher records. Three principal findings emerge. First, the standardised portfolio is smaller than commonly reported: three Federal Information Processing Standards are published, a fourth remains in development, and a fifth algorithm has been selected but not yet standardised, a distinction that matters because procurement obligations attach only to published standards. Second, two candidates that reached advanced evaluation were defeated by classical rather than quantum cryptanalysis, one within a weekend on consumer hardware. Third, published estimates of the quantum resources required to break widely deployed key sizes have moved by more than an order of magnitude in a single dimension within six years, exchanging machine size for running time. The review concludes that cryptographic agility, not the selection of any particular algorithm, is the durable objective, and that migration should be prioritised by the confidentiality lifetime of data rather than by forecasts of adversary capability. Keywords: Standardization; Keywords: post-quantum cryptography; cryptographic migration; cryptographic agility; critical infrastructure