Arnar Birgisson
Software Engineer at Google
San Francisco, California, United States
Summary
🤩
Rockstar🎓
Top SchoolArnar Birgisson is a seasoned software engineer based in San Francisco with 19 years of experience bridging research and production engineering. Currently at Google since 2013, he brings deep expertise in security and authentication standards, having contributed to high-profile open standards like WebAuthn and U2F reference implementations. His background includes a PhD in Language-Based Security and research internships at Google and Microsoft, underscoring a strong foundation in formal reasoning and privacy-preserving techniques. Arnar’s contributions span front-end demo work to back-end attestation clarifications, reflecting an ability to move between UI polish and low-level cryptographic protocol details. He combines academic rigor with practical product impact, often improving specification clarity that directly affects device attestation and platform interoperability. Colleagues can expect a thoughtful engineer who pairs long-term research perspective with pragmatic engineering at scale.
19 years of coding experience
B.Sc., Mathematics, B.Sc., Mathematics at Háskóli ÍslandsM.Sc., Computer Science, M.Sc., Computer Science at Reykjavik UniversityPhD, Computer Science, PhD, Computer Science at Chalmers University of Technology
Icelandic, English, Swedish
Github Skills (13)
it-security10
javas10
spec10
javascript10
specification10
java10
webauthn10
security10
google-app-engine9
cbor9
appengine9
web-development9
api-design8
Programming languages (10)
Github contributions (5)
google/u2f-ref-code
Jun 2014 - Jun 2016
U2F reference implementations
Role in this project:
Full-stack Developer
Full-stack DeveloperContributions:40 commits, 4 PRs, 6 pushes in 2 years
Contributions summary:Arnar primarily focused on updating the demo applications within the repository, including modifying JavaScript and Java code for the GAE demo. They were involved in integrating new extension APIs and making changes to the UI, as evidenced by the modifications to `u2fdemo.js` and `main.soy`. Furthermore, the user contributed to the server-side logic for the U2F implementation, with changes to the servlets.
implementationsu2f
w3c/webauthn
Dec 2017 - Jun 2022
Web Authentication: An API for accessing Public Key Credentials
Role in this project:Back-end Developer & Security Engineer
Back-end Developer & Security EngineerContributions:11 reviews, 8 commits, 5 PRs in 4 years 6 months
Contributions summary:Arnar primarily contributed to the specification of the WebAuthn standard, focusing on detailed clarification and corrections within the specification documents. Their work involved addressing ambiguities in attestation procedures, especially concerning Android Key Attestation and U2F attestation formats. They also introduced and clarified extensions for device public key functionality, improving the overall security and clarity of the standard.
authenticationpublic-keywebauthn
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