Donncha Cearbhaill
Head Of Security Lab - Amnesty Tech at Amnesty International
Berlin, Germany
Summary
🤩
Rockstar🎓
Top SchoolDonncha Cearbhaill is Head of Amnesty Tech’s Security Lab and a hacker-researcher with 13 years of experience exposing targeted digital surveillance against journalists, activists and civil society. He led technical investigations at the center of the Pegasus Project and other high-impact research that prompted parliamentary inquiries, legal actions, and government changes to privacy-preserving COVID apps. Donncha combines deep vulnerability research—finding critical RCEs in widely used software like Ubuntu—with hands-on contributions to open-source privacy tools such as Tor, SecureDrop and the Mobile Verification Toolkit. Based in Berlin, he blends offensive technical skill with human-rights advocacy, often serving as an expert witness in legislative bodies. His background includes building security tooling for civil-society groups (e.g., a free web security service at eQualit.ie) and improving core anonymity and whistleblower platforms. Colleagues describe him as a rare practitioner who pairs meticulous forensic engineering with strategic impact on policy and practice.
13 years of coding experience
9 years of employment as a software developer
Bachelor of Arts - BA, Medicinal Chemistry, II.I, Bachelor of Arts - BA, Medicinal Chemistry, II.I at Trinity College, DublinLeaving Certificate, 505 CAO Points, Leaving Certificate, 505 CAO Points at St. Brendans Community School, Birr
English, German
Github Skills (21)
ios10
python10
sec10
c1110
jinjava10
flask-ask10
c1710
security10
security-testing10
mobile-security10
security-scan10
flask10
tor10
networking9
sqlite9
Programming languages (11)
Github contributions (5)
mvt-project/mvt
Dec 2021 - Jun 2022
MVT (Mobile Verification Toolkit) helps with conducting forensics of mobile devices in order to find signs of a potential compromise.
Role in this project:
Mobile Developer (iOS) & Security Engineer
Mobile Developer (iOS) & Security EngineerContributions:2 releases, 14 reviews, 25 commits in 6 months
Contributions summary:Donncha primarily contributed to the MVT (Mobile Verification Toolkit) project, focusing on iOS forensic analysis. Their work included adding modules to parse and analyze iOS Shortcuts, which is useful to identify potentially malicious actions in the shortcuts. They also introduced a configuration profile module, which is a useful step towards identifying possible security exploits. Further contributions expanded the capabilities of existing modules, like the WhatsApp module, to search for links in attachments. These contributions suggest a strong focus on mobile security and forensic analysis.
mvtsecuritysignsandroidforensics
torproject/tor
Mar 2015 - Jun 2016
unofficial git repo -- report bugs/issues/pull requests on https://gitlab.torproject.org/ --
Role in this project:Back-end Developer
Back-end DeveloperContributions:18 commits in 1 year 2 months
Contributions summary:Donncha primarily contributed to the back-end logic of the Tor project, focusing on the control port and hidden service functionalities. Their work involved implementing the "+HSPOST" command, allowing for HS descriptor uploads through the control port and enhancing event monitoring. They fixed a segfault in the HSPOST command and added the "HS_DESC CREATED" control event. Furthermore, the user modified the service descriptor cache and made updates to the rendezvous service and client-side descriptor cache.
rustsecurityreportgitlabpull-requests
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