Consensus Layer of Bitcoin

No direct affect: Bitcoin’s consensus mechanism, which depends on SHA-256 and ECDSA, wouldn’t be immediately affected by the cracking of AES, because it doesn’t use AES for its core capabilities.

Consumer’s Bitcoin Wallets

Oblique affect on pockets safety: Main {hardware} wallets (Trezor, Ledger, KeepKey) concentrate on safe key storage and bodily system integrity moderately than AES encryption. Subsequently, the direct affect on these wallets can be minimal.

Bitcoin Availability for Theft

Restricted direct threat: The quantity of Bitcoin in danger wouldn’t immediately improve because of AES being compromised, as Bitcoin addresses and keys don’t depend on AES. The publicity of full public keys from tackle reuse poses a threat provided that ECDSA is compromised. (Word that bitcoin can nonetheless be safe underneath cracked ECDSA, however any tackle which has a spent transaction output may have its non-public key uncovered)

Bitcoin’s Future Submit-Occasion

No protocol change is important for AES.
Since Bitcoin’s core protocol doesn’t depend upon AES, cracking AES wouldn’t necessitate a protocol change or perhaps a comfortable fork for Bitcoin’s operations. Nevertheless, peripheral methods utilizing AES could must improve their safety (e.g. some wallets reminiscent of Bitcoin Core).

So in abstract, peripheral safety measures would possibly want reevaluation, however the major mechanisms of Bitcoin stay safe towards an AES compromise.