A counter-terrorism and multi-disciplinary security expert, who claims he has was dismissed by Amazon for whistleblowing about alleged shortfalls in the tech giant’s protection of client data, has asked a judge to direct Amazon Data Services Ireland Limited to reinstate him.
Paul McCarthy, of Barrack Street, Drogheda, Co Louth, has told the Circuit Civil Court he moved from Australia to Ireland more than five years ago to assess and advise Amazon on improvements to security at the tech giant’s data centres around the world.
Mr McCarthy appeared before Judge John O’Connor today on foot of short service permission to seek reinstatement as physical security architect with the company or an equally important and similarly remunerated position.
He told the court that prior to joining Amazon in 2019 he had almost 30 years’ experience in identifying security gaps and advising on solutions for the United Nations Security Council Counter Terrorism Directorate, British counter terrorism alumni, including the SAS, and US Homeland Security.
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Mr McCarthy said he had remained with Amazon “despite significant challenges and poor treatment”. Due to an internal reorganisation shortly after he joined Amazon he had been assigned to overseeing Data Centre Design and Engineering in the Asia Pacific Japan and China (APJC) region until early 2024.
“There are a number of well-known internal problems concerning the maintenance and management of security which mostly hinge on structure and culture,” Mr McCarthy stated in written evidence
Many of these issues had been recognised by the company and he had made a series of protected disclosures over the course of his employment relating to serious concerns regarding the physical and infrastructural security of Amazon data.
“I believe that as a result of these protected disclosures I was subjected to an unfair performance improvement programme…and ultimately dismissed on Thursday March 6th. I believe that this dismissal was directly caused by my raising issues regarding Amazon’s security problems which constituted protected disclosures,” McCarthy said.
He had since appealed the decision to dismiss him but due to his dismissal he did not have access to his emails or to the majority of documents relating to his employment.
Mr McCarthy said that in early 2022 Amazon was threatened by right wing terrorists and an attempt to purchase bombs to blow up a data centre which was thwarted with the assistance of the FBI. It had been proposed to install water cannons loaded with chemical spray at the front of data centres. He said he had formed serious concerns about this matter both in terms of its potential effectiveness and its risk to the public as well as staff members.
In his written evidence on which his application for leave for short service of his proceedings on Amazon had been based during an earlier ex-parte application, McCarthy said he had expressed his concerns at the time after having been asked to write a technical response which he claimed had been blocked and 100 per cent support given to the water cannon initiative. This report had also constituted a protected disclosure.
McCarthy said this security programme had been shot down in less than two years following expenditure of $400 million. He believed the reason the programme had been shot down echoed the risks he had raised in his initial report that had been blocked.
He said that following this he had been entered, without notice, into an internal performance improvement programme which was extremely embarrassing and upsetting but the only alternative to which was to resign his position. He had undergone several such programmes.
In response to an email to staff from the company chief executive officer he said he had replied at the end of 2024 highlighting deficiencies in management that had created vulnerabilities that threatened security of customer data.
Judge O’Connor was told by counsel for Amazon that Mr McCarthy, who was in court, had obtained short service returnable to today and, subject to court approval, a time frame arrangement had been reached whereby Amazon would by next Wednesday submit a replying affidavit to Mr McCarthy’s written evidence, followed by a response from Mr McCarthy by April 16th.
The matter could then go back to the first week of next term without prejudice to Mr McCarthy as he was remaining on full pay for the next three months.
Judge O’Connor put the matter in for mention before him on April 29th.
