France’s national cybersecurity agency, ANSSI, plans to make post-quantum cryptography (PQC) a condition for security products entering its qualification process from 2027, according to a post-quantum FAQ the agency published in October 2025. Reuters reported on June 16 that Samih Souissi, an official at ANSSI, told the France Quantum conference in Paris that the agency would stop certifying security products that lack quantum-resistant encryption from 2027 and that businesses should be buying only quantum-safe products by 2030.
In the FAQ, ANSSI wrote that it aims to introduce PQC obligations for products entering qualification from 2027. PQC is a family of public-key algorithms designed to resist attack by quantum computers. In the same FAQ, ANSSI wrote that European certification does not make PQC algorithms mandatory.
The written policy covers qualification, a separate ANSSI process from certification, so it is narrower than the remark Reuters reported. ANSSI has also advised buyers against purchasing products without PQC after 2030.
ANSSI describes certification as an evaluation of how well one version of a product resists attack. For qualification, ANSSI also attests that the product meets identified needs and that its supplier can honor long-term commitments. In its qualification and certification FAQ, ANSSI wrote that qualification is recommended by the French state.
ANSSI’s written plan
ANSSI set out a three-phase transition in a January 2022 position paper. In the second phase, expected no earlier than 2025, products would use hybrid cryptography to provide post-quantum security assurance. In a hybrid scheme, a classical algorithm is paired with a post-quantum one, so an attacker would have to break both.
ANSSI expected the third phase, optional standalone PQC, “probably not earlier than 2030.” In a follow-up paper in late 2023, the agency wrote that for end products in the second phase, “any product that includes post-quantum mitigation shall implement hybridation,” except products protected only by hash-based signatures, which rely solely on hash functions. ANSSI set those conditions for evaluations leading to its security visa, the label it gives to products it has certified or qualified.
In the October 2025 FAQ, ANSSI wrote that cryptography is currently regulated in France for classified defense information, data marked Diffusion Restreinte, vital information systems, and product certifications and qualifications. Diffusion Restreinte is a French protective marking for sensitive material that is not classified. Operators of vital importance, France’s designated critical-infrastructure operators, run those vital information systems.
ANSSI wrote that the regulatory texts for those areas would be revised to include PQC and that no dedicated regulation is planned beyond them at present. In its answer for buyers, ANSSI wrote that organizations holding no classified or Diffusion Restreinte data have no regulatory obligation, unless they are operators of vital importance. The agency gave its 2030 purchasing advice in the same answer.
On October 16, 2025, ANSSI announced what it called the first two certifications in France of products with lattice-based post-quantum algorithms. ANSSI issued both under the Common Criteria, an international standard for evaluating the security of IT products. The two products are a Thales smartcard, the MultiApp 5.2 Premium PQC, and a Samsung microcontroller, the S3SSE2A.
In its post-quantum FAQ, ANSSI named certification and PG-083, its rules for choosing and sizing cryptographic mechanisms, as the bases of qualification. ANSSI published version 3.00 of PG-083 in March 2026.
In version 3.00, ANSSI recommended aiming for post-quantum security for any mechanism meant to be used beyond January 1, 2030, or exposed to a risk of retroactive attack. In such an attack, often called harvest now, decrypt later, an adversary records encrypted data now to decrypt it once a capable quantum computer exists.
Remarks at France Quantum
“It’s not only a technical issue,” Souissi said, according to Reuters. “It’s a matter of governance, industrial planning, regulation, and sovereignty.” Reuters wrote that “ANSSI approval is required for use in French government agencies and critical infrastructure.”
Fanny Bouton, head of quantum at OVHcloud, told Reuters that the cloud provider faces two challenges in meeting ANSSI’s requirements – auditing its products and securing all the data it holds. IBM executive Jerry Chow said at the event that the quantum threat could emerge by the mid-2030s, Reuters reported.
Next dates
In its post-quantum FAQ, ANSSI gave no month in 2027 for the qualification obligations. The next date in ANSSI’s documents is January 1, 2030. In PG-083, ANSSI recommends post-quantum security for cryptographic mechanisms used after that date.
