Gartner’s September 30, 2026 release says organizations that do not begin piloting post-quantum cryptography by 2027 will face at least 200% higher costs for the full migration. The same release says a survey of CISOs found 51% had not begun any post-quantum work. Christopher Mixter, a Gartner vice president analyst, describes harvest-now-decrypt-later and harvest-now-forge-later as reasons the data you store now is already part of the decision.
The claim
The 200% figure is Gartner’s prediction, not a quote you have measured in your own estate. Use it as a reason to inventory, not as a number to paste into a budget as if it were your quote. The 51% figure is a description of peers who have not started. It is not a reason to wait with them.
The pilot
- Where do you use public-key cryptography today: TLS, VPN, code signing, email, document signing, and the keys inside vendor products? A pilot that only covers the website certificate is a demo.
- Which data, if stolen this year and decrypted later, would still matter? That is the harvest-now list. Customer secrets and long-lived signatures belong on it. Ephemeral session data often does not.
- Who owns the inventory, and what does “begun” mean? Gartner’s 51% is “have not begun any PQC-related activities.” A slide titled “quantum” with no system in scope is not a beginning.
- What would the pilot change in ninety days: one protocol, one vendor that already offers a hybrid mode, or a list of products that cannot? Write the change, not the theme.
FAQ
Do we need a quantum computer to start?
No. Gartner’s point is the migration of cryptography you already run, and the copies of data already leaving the building. The pilot is an inventory and a first system, not a physics project.
Is 200% our number?
No. It is Gartner’s prediction of cost for organizations that have not started a pilot by 2027. Get a vendor quote for your own estate before you brief it as a line item.