Principal Architect

DigitalOcean•Boston, MA

7h•$235,200 - $294,000•Remote

About The Position

DigitalOcean is seeking a Staff Software Engineer (IC6) to join their Customer Trust & Engineering organization. This role will serve as the technical owner of Identity & Access Management (IAM) and Key Management Services (KMS). These services are critical for trust at DigitalOcean, handling billions of transactions per second with low latency and securing customer data. As an IC6, the individual will define the future of these platforms for the next two to three years, lead engineering teams, drive architectural strategy across multiple teams, and resolve complex technical challenges. The role requires a passion for distributed systems, cryptographic security, and building foundational infrastructure for millions of developers.

Requirements

10+ years of software engineering experience, with at least 4+ years focused on Identity (AuthN/AuthZ), Key Management, or high-scale distributed systems in a cloud or IaaS environment
Expert-level proficiency in Go and deep experience with gRPC microservices architecture
Deep knowledge of identity protocols (OIDC, OAuth2, SAML, SCIM) and access control models (RBAC, ABAC, PBAC), with a track record of delivering these at cloud scale
Hands-on experience designing or operating key management infrastructure, including envelope encryption, HSM integration, and BYOK/CMEK patterns
Proven ability to build systems that handle consensus, replication, and partitioning at scale with strong reliability and observability
Deep experience with Kubernetes, SQL (MySQL), and Infrastructure as Code (Terraform)
Demonstrated track record of driving ambiguous, multi-team platform initiatives from problem definition through to shipped, production capability
Ability to write crisp RFCs, present architectural strategy to senior leadership, and align diverse teams around a shared technical direction

Nice To Haves

Experience with SPIFFE/SPIRE or workload identity federation
Familiarity with secrets management platforms (e.g., HashiCorp Vault)
Contributions to open-source identity or cryptography projects

Responsibilities

Define and drive the multi-year technical roadmap for IAM and KMS, including authentication, authorization, secrets management, and cryptographic key lifecycle across DigitalOcean's global, multi-tenant cloud platform.
Design high-availability, low-latency identity and key management services in Go that handle massive, sustained load across global regions with strong consistency and full auditability.
Architect secure token exchange patterns and identity context injection for agentic AI workflows, building the IAM foundations for DigitalOcean's emerging AI/ML platform offerings.
Design and deliver a robust, multi-tenant KMS, including envelope encryption, customer-managed key patterns, and HSM-backed key material.
Drive the evolution of the Policy Engine (Rego/OPA) to support advanced resource-level permissions, dynamic scoping, network-aware access conditions, and complex authorization demands of agentic workflows.
Partner with Inference, Billing, DOKS, and Platform Security to resolve architectural gaps that span multiple teams.
Serve as the connective tissue between identity and the broader cloud platform, ensuring security enables developer velocity.
Establish cryptographic and identity engineering standards adopted org-wide.
Lead design reviews for changes with cross-cutting platform risk and author RFCs that shape DigitalOcean's technical direction.
Mentor and develop senior and mid-level engineers across IAM and adjacent teams.
Conduct deep code reviews, model architectural thinking, and build a culture of security-first engineering.