Trust Is the New Security: The AI & Quantum Threat Reshaping Finance by 2029 | Maxwell Denega, Founder & CEO of Quantum Chain

Max. Quantum - TO ADD INTRO TEASER V2.0 === Max: Oh, really? No, I'm saving now for a midlife crisis.

Although I've been a founder for three years, it feels like a midlife crisis. It's stressful. The horrible thing is with what we are doing if I don't get to year seven, then the world kind of doesn't get there either. So it is a lot of responsibility.

Monica: Can we backtrack? Max: Yeah. Because that's, that's a big statement, but it's, it's true. Yeah.

Monica: Okay. So if you don't get to year seven, Max: then the world kind of doesn't get there either. Monica: Max, it's Max: Hello. Monica: A pleasure having you here.

Thank you. Max: Good to be here, Monica. Yeah. Monica: Having fun.

Max: Always. Monica: Good. Good, good. You Max: have to in this industry.

Monica: Yeah. Yes. Have you laugh all you going? No, but that is true in this industry.

You have to have fun. It's intense. So if you don't have fun, then Max: yeah, it can be overwhelming. Monica: It can be too much.

Max: Absolutely. Monica: You and I spoke the other day. Max: Mm-hmm. Monica: And basically we were talking about founder journey.

Yes. And but it's hard. But at the same time you were like, but I have to do this because I have to. Somebody has to do this.

Yes. And basically, just for context, we'll go into what you do in a second, but it's like, this is about. Security quantum, it's a topic that I'm not an expert in. That's why I do, we have Max: issue.

I, uh, very few people really are, but I don't think you need to be an expert in that to understand what the threats are. Okay. Monica: So tell us about who you're, what you do. Max: Okay.

Right, so most of you probably know who I'm by now, Scott. I think our marketing team's done pretty well, but I'm Max, I'm the founder and CO of quantum chain and, uh, we are the future of global financial. Security basically. So a quantum secure blockchain, it goes a little bit further than that, but that's the, uh, that's the gist of it.

And our mission is to bring finance, not just on chain, but into a future proof state. So I'm a firm believer that all, all assets are going on chain. And so they must be secure not only against quantum, but against ai, which is something a lot of people are. Overlooking at the moment, but is actually responsible for most of the hacks that we've seen lately and harvest now de cryp later attacks.

Monica: I want to step back Max: Sure. Monica: Just for everyone I'm a in plain English because Max: tough in this Monica: topic. Participate in the conversation. Mm-hmm.

Max: So, Monica: plain English. What's quantum? Max: Okay. So quantum computing.

Okay, it's the advancement of using quantum algorithms and specific hardware to create computers that are powerful enough to use post quantum algorithms, right, to attack existing legacy computers. Monica: Oh, Max: and let's break them. Alright, so the financial industry specifically is still dependent on 50-year-old encryption. And so can be broken with, uh, advancements in this area that aren't that far away.

Google recently released, uh, a couple of papers on crypto vulnerability, which highlight this in deep detail. Uh, and even the fact that retrofitting mainstream protocols change like Ethereum for example doesn't come without serious issues. So it's kind of scary not trying to fear monger in this area. That does happen a lot, but, uh, yeah, it is, it is a scary thing happening.

Monica: Can you explain to us what are the risks of quantum Hmm. So that's, that's a very generic thing. 'cause if I say everything, I'm both right and wrong. So every industry specifically finance is.

Again, protected by these encryptions that are now too old to be able to handle, uh, being broken by algorithms like, like Shor's I mean, some people probably heard what that is. Max: That's a post quantum algorithm. So the risk is everyone, we are trusting with our money, our finances, our products, and the services might not be able to secure them for that much longer. And a lot of people argue that the blockchain is.

The immediate answer for that, but unfortunately it's not because the same dependencies exist there. Monica: So you used the word they will not be able to secure it for that much longer. Mm. So what I'm paraphrasing is the industry has secured protocols Max: Yes.

Monica: That will be become obsolete soon given the technology and then we are under, there's a threat. Max: Oh, absolutely. Monica: So that's the summary. Max: That's the summary.

Yeah. Exactly. Well, Monica: financial services stops being secure. That is quite scary.

Max: Yeah. Yeah. And it's funny, we don't even say the word security so much anymore. It's trust.

Trust is a thing that's, that's now at risk. Yeah. Because there, there will be solutions, not just us at Quantum Chain, but some others that happen, but we have to then build trust for you to go, okay, that's where the security is. So trust is the first frontier, right.

Monica: Building trust in the new security protocols or what type of trust Max: and the brand? Just brands in general. That's why, um, you know, I'm not exactly shy about putting my face out there because this for me, uh, is not a business. This is a, a mission for me because, uh, I was subject to a hack about three and a half years ago, um, after doing fairly well in the industry.

So I, I woke up one day with about $4 million portfolio just gone. Uh, so it's quite clear I had been hacked. Still don't exactly know how, but I was taking all, you know, known security measures at the time, and it was across multiple platforms, so it was a very targeted thing. So I then sort of had a choice whether to try and trade again, you know, keep being a bit of a crypto bro working in finance or build a system that meant.

Not only does the user of my chain never have to feel what I felt, but you know, that mission grew into something much larger, much bigger scale. Now it's an entire industry threat and we're trying to build not just the infrastructure, but later product services in, dare I even say a quantum bank that, uh, fixes that. Yeah. Well, let's call it a quantum bank.

It sounds better. Monica: Okay. Max: But yeah. So a quantum for the future, a quantum resistant bank.

Yes, absolutely. That's on the roadmap. Monica: I always say, or I've said in the past, anyone who's done a migration mm-hmm. Knows how painful it's to do immigration.

Max: Yes. Monica: So what I'm hearing is. There's these new security protocols that we'll have to adopt. Mm-hmm.

Max: There Monica: needs to be some sort of, we are here, we need to get there, there needs to be some sort of system migration. Max: Okay. So if we're talking about banks yeah. Financial services transformation, especially globally, can take years upon years and years.

And if, if we're listening to Google, which I, I've advised you probably do they're saying that. Between now and 2009 is when the issue is now, I'm not gonna use the term Q day because there is no specific 2 2, 9 20 2029. Sorry. Monica: 29.

Yeah. Max: 2029. Monica: 2029. Max: Yeah.

No, we're not going back in time. That's a different quantum thing. Okay. 2029.

But that means that the, uh, the problems are going to start between now and then. Right. So we're going to see milestones in this industry that speed up and compound progress, not just in quantum computing, but like hopefully in the resistance area too. I mean, if we have anything to do with it.

Yeah, I hope so. It means 2029 is like, that's when we should really be worried and if, if financial transformation, a migration towards post quantum securities and AI securities for any bank takes longer than that, which it inevitably will. I might not get there. Monica: That's worrying.

Max: It's worrying. But actually that's why we chose to use blockchain in the first place because it's a layered system and you can put securities in place in multiple areas. Also, AI across, uh, across the protocol for things like compliance and completely change the key distribution methods, which we have to create a quantum virtual machine. It can be not, not plugged in, let's say, but used by a bank much more easily than a full migration to new protocols.

So actually it's, uh, it helps. Monica: Okay. We talked about quantum and ai. We put them together.

Max: Oh, yes. Monica: And then that's an issue. Max: Yes. Okay.

So now everybody is focused on quantum and quantum security. They are completely ignoring the elephant in the room, which is ai. And AI is responsible for most of the harvest now, de group later attacks that we have going on and frankly all the other attacks as well. Things like USR, maybe not drift.

I think that was something else. But kelp dow the other day. An adversary only has to take a smart contract now, feed it into. An AI system and say, how can I exploit this?

And it'll come up with very simple ideas like, okay, the withdrawal contract is the, the parameters are upside down so we can exploit this. Very simple. There's probably a reason why most of the, uh, amounts of money being stolen are quite similar, but yes, ai poses a threat now, but eventually we'll have AI powered, sorry, quantum powered ai. Which is a whole new level of threat that, uh, basically changes our security dynamic from are we prepared for an attack one day to we are being attacked 24 7 3 6 5, and any vulnerability will be exploited.

So people are gonna have to take this a bit more seriously. Monica: Yeah, exactly. We don't. It's like, I'm sure you don't want to scare me.

And I'm like, oh my God. Oh, Max: I mean, it is a Monica: little scary, but at the same time I'm like it's pretty scary. Max: It is. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, we are, we are doing our best to, get enough exposure on quantum chain so that we can help in time. Uh, and I think for the most part we will. But there will be some, some banks, some household brand names that.

will probably fall away during this, this transition. Monica: So I forgot to say something about you. Max: Okay. Monica: Ginning of the episode.

As you were speaking, I'm like, he's speaking like someone that knows security, not tech, but like safety, security attacks. Max: Mm-hmm. Monica: But a background. Max: Um, okay.

So I started out in the military, British military. I joined the Royal Navy. Um, I tried to get into engineering but I was very quickly put into anti-piracy, which evolved into, uh, other things. So when you say security, more of a physical Monica: Yeah.

Max: Security if you like. But it's less about security, more about people. You learn about people, general psychology, and to be honest, the negative sides of psychology, and that that helps you be prepared for what people can do or how exploits can happen rather than what they would do. You know, so maybe that's a little bit of paranoia, but, uh, Monica: no, Max: that helps, I think.

Monica: But we need people. It's like I'm naive. Like I'm not, I'm not thinking like, oh, so and so is going to kill me. Like, I'm like, the world is a peaceful place.

Max: Well, let's, let's kill more. Steal your money in this, in this case. But, uh, Monica: yeah. Yeah.

But it's like, I brought that up 'cause I like that. Because you, you are trained by the military to protect, Max: to be ready for certain eventualities, Monica: to be ready for risks. Max: To expect, yes, exactly. To expect risks.

Monica: Therefore, you're bringing that mindset Max: Yeah. To Monica: the whole energy and the whole, how you run the company and how you question it Exactly. Around the mission. Max: The biggest way that helped, so I was in the military and then I moved to banking.

So I was in financial crime compliance and then I moved to investment banking, technology and platforms, right? So between those two experiences and having worked in dangerous areas and then in financially dangerous areas and with SWIFT and other systems like that, uh, when we build quantum chain. We processed every eventuality, what the industry needs, what enterprise and even sovereign use cases will need for the foreseeable future. Because we knew that, you know, legacy and even new protocols at that point, they just weren't built for anything more than conceptual use.

So that's why we focused on proof of authority governance and being public permission at the same time. So it was suitable for those use cases later, and we, we knew that was gonna happen, so we built it perfectly. Monica: So, like perfectly. Max: It might be true, it might be true.

Monica: Coming back to the Quantum and AI together. Max: Yes. Your Monica: solution ready? Max: Oh, yes.

Yeah, yeah. We are live, we've been live for about a year and a half now. And actually, um, one of the big problems that we see with. Especially migrations and roadmaps from other protocols is besides a lot of attack vectors being completely missed.

And that even includes things like people and governance. And again, ai, we've gotta remember that AI is being used now to create all of the breakthroughs of the last two years we've seen. And that includes in things like missed encryptions. So if you used, uh, a system in the last sort of, let's say 18 months, it's highly likely that AI has created that in the first place.

That's why the, um. The advancements have happened so quickly, you know, like a compacted effect. So it's that system is not only open source created by ai, it's then on someone else's server. So that's accessible by other ai.

And if, even if it wasn't, frankly, all it would take is going to a, a GitHub type repository, putting it into ai, and then it's exploitable. So, I'm sorry, but, um, most of the roadmaps you see from protocols like Ethereum and Tron recently. It's not gonna work. Monica: So I'm like, yeah, you paint a scary picture.

But having said that, there is also, like you touched about that in the beginning, like assets, different types of assets. Max: Yes. Right. Monica: And you used the word quantum resistance.

Max: Yeah. Monica: How can we build. Quantum resistant assets, is that a, is that Q assets a fair question? Max: Yeah, so, okay, so we are, we're obviously tackling SEO and branding quite well, so we're just quantum naming everything.

So if you see Q or quantum, it's Monica: Q, Max: it's eventually gonna go. So we call them quantum assets, but really what we mean by that is, uh, we have a QRC standard. So with Ethereum they've got ERC as of QC, so to create a quantum safe asset, uh, it's essentially building that asset, launching it on quantum chain. And actually that's, that's going to go a step further.

'cause this year we are building somewhat of a quantum blockchain alliance and bringing in, uh, a number of other trusted sort of quantum chains. So obviously we're the og, uh, and then forming something. We're consortium. So yeah, quantum assets will.

Will be the future of assets, I think. Monica: Okay. So if I'm a Neobank or a FinTech or a bank, normal Fiat bank. Max: Yep.

Monica: I'm the founder. The CEO. The CPO. What should I be thinking about right now to protect the company?

Max: Okay, so we, there's a little bit of time here to consider, but obviously h and DL attacks are happening, there needs to be an immediate solution to try and stop that. Now we do have a solution that's off chain called H-T-T-P-Q, which is similar to A-H-T-T-P-S system. So domain certification, we comms that can be implemented in 14 days, so that would effectively stop harvest now de later attacks for even a bank, let's say, and that's across industry. The next step is figuring out the strategy for.

Your assets to become quantum safe or your rails to become quantum safe, right? So considering something like quantum chain, you'd start in a modulated fashion, right? Let's start with custody. So you test quantum safe custody and then tokenizing of an asset, and you have pilots for that now too.

So let's say a simple bond, easy to create. Once that's been tested, you move forward to things like payment rails. So we're already iso compliant amongst other things. So cross-border payments become very, very simple.

Uh, and then go on from there. So, and it's a bit of a, a step by step process for a bank to become fully quantum safe within their sort of risk tolerances and compliance. But we make it as easy as possible. Amazing.

Yeah. Yeah. Will be. Monica: Whenever I go podcast, my favorite section is the Family Journey.

Yeah, it takes me like time. That's usually where the most, the most pain is time. I'm like, it takes me a long time to do that and I really enjoy, but I think that will have to be another conversation. Max: Mm Monica: sure.

But if I wanted to summarize, almost to summarize, what's the best question to ask you on your founder journey? Max: Well, I think we covered that actually, and that's where it came from. So it came from not just my experience, but a hard, painful event. So for me, this, again, it's not a business I, I have to be successful.

And there's, Monica: oh, there's Max: no other way I know the Monica: question. Max: Okay. I Monica: know the question. Okay.

Got, I love getting into people's mindsets. Max: Sure. Of Monica: course. Being a founder is hard.

Yeah. Max: Yeah. Monica: It's like Max: more than people tell you, Monica: it's like, it's tough. Max: Yeah.

Monica: I've been working with 10 years. Max: Yeah. Monica: I mean, I'm the one supporting them. Max: Yeah.

I mean, I'm drinking coffee, but these conversations should be over a bottle of whiskey or something. Monica: So. Mindset. Max: Yeah.

Monica: You've got an impressive mindset. Max: Thank you. Monica: So ask the last question. Tell us about your mindset.

When it gets tough Max: you that that's exactly the right way to frame it. So you need resiliency, like, oh my God, do you need resiliency? Because you can prepare for every single problem to happen and there will be problems that you did not foresee. Okay, you think you're going to raise money by this time?

You are. You are not. Uh, you think this problem's not gonna occur. It is right.

You think adoption's gonna happen quickly, it also won't. So you have to be incredibly resilient and as consistent as possible. I probably, a lot of people say this, but you have to show up every day and really give it everything you've got, but also try and, balance yourself. Yes, exactly.

A little bit not Monica: to. So I want to go deeper. Resilience. Max: Yeah.

Monica: How, I think think what goes through your mind. What's the beauty? It's like, what do you tell yourself? Max: For me, it's, whatever's happened to me.

Worse has happened. Monica: The worst has Max: happened. Worse has happened to me already, right? There's nothing you can do to me, you, nothing that the industry can do to me that I haven't experienced worse.

You know, you'll never get there Um, and the second part is again. I feel like if I don't show up every day, if I'm not successful in this, in this endeavor, and even however many years after that, it takes that there could actually be a worldwide issue. And maybe that's not wholly true because there are others who are attacking the same issue, et cetera. We're facing the same goal.

That's great. But it might make a huge difference. If I, if I decided to wake up tomorrow and I said, I don't wanna do this anymore, what happens? We could lose a.

A whole segment of future finance that I, I, I don't want to give that to the world, you know, I want, I want safe finance for everybody and more inclusive finance as well. So that's a different topic. Monica: Cool. Max: Yeah.

Monica: Ance and consistency. Max: Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, that's, that's the key.

Monica: Previous conversation, we were speaking with a tri in the industry and she was saying, secret is discipline. Max: Absolutely. Yes, it is. Monica: Say consistency equals discipline.

Yeah. So I love seeing comparable. Max: Yeah. Yeah.

We probably have, uh, very similar mindset in this. Monica: Amazing. Cool. Max: My Monica: pleasure, Max: Monica.

Thank you. Monica: Thank you. Thank you, max. Thank you.