Paradigm Partner Proposes PACTs Mechanism to Provide Protection Path for Quantum-Vulnerable Bitcoin Addresses

Odaily Odaily, Dan Robinson, General Partner at Paradigm, has proposed "Provable Address Control Timestamps" (PACTs) mechanism, aiming to provide a protection path for Bitcoin addresses under the potential threat of quantum computing. The scheme allows coin holders to generate on-chain commitments using address control proofs via BIP-322, combined with a random salt value. It utilizes OpenTimestamps for temporal anchoring, establishing proof of ownership without revealing wallet information. If quantum-vulnerable addresses are frozen in the future through a soft fork, users can submit STARK zero-knowledge proofs when spending to unlock assets. The mechanism also offers a potential recovery path for wallets derived based on BIP-32, but its implementation still relies on Bitcoin introducing STARK verification capabilities and obtaining community consensus. (CoinDesk)