Software Development Engineer, AWS Identity, IAM Data Plane - Credentials Distribution Systems

Amazon; Seattle (WA); On-site; USD 143,700 - 194,400; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

401(k) matching

Paid time off

Parental leave

Job summary

Amazon is seeking a Software Development Engineer for the AWS Credentials Distribution Systems team in Seattle, WA. This role focuses on building and operating critical credential distribution infrastructure used across Amazon. The ideal candidate has extensive experience in software development and system architecture, with skills in C#, C++, Java, or Perl. Responsibilities include enhancing system reliability, driving automated solutions, and collaborating with service teams. A comprehensive benefits package is offered with competitive salary ranging from $143,700 to $194,400 annually based on qualifications.

Qualifications

• 3+ years of non-internship professional software development experience.
• Experience designing or architecting systems for reliability and scaling.
• Proficient in at least one programming language used in distributed applications.

Responsibilities

• Design, build, and operate a credential distribution system for all service teams.
• Own and improve system reliability, scalability, and security.
• Drive automation and operational excellence through monitoring and improvements.

Skills

C#

C++

Java

Perl

Object Oriented Design

Distributed Systems

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science

Job description

Description

What does it take to distribute billions of security credentials every day to every host across Amazon’s infrastructure - without ever going down? That's the challenge at the core of this role.

As a Software Development Engineer on the AWS Credentials Distribution Systems (CreDS) team, you'll build and operate the IAM role credential distribution platform for Amazon's internal infrastructure — a tier-0 system that every single service team across the company depends on. Your work ensures that hosts receive short-lived, least-privilege credentials seamlessly, eliminating the operational burden of credential rotation at Amazon's scale. Your primary focus will be keeping this system secure, scalable, and resilient — designing for failure and driving automation. You'll also work backwards from internal customers to simplify credential management, building features and tooling that make adoption seamless and effortless for service teams.

Strong ownership and operational excellence are essential to succeed in this role. If you're passionate about distributed systems, cloud security, and building infrastructure that thousands of teams depend on every day, this is the role for you.

Key job responsibilities

• Design, build, and operate a tier-0 credential distribution system that serves every service team across Amazon's internal infrastructure

• Own and continuously improve system reliability, scalability, and security — proactively identifying risks and building mechanisms to prevent recurring issues

• Work backwards from internal customers to simplify credential management, building features and tooling that make adoption seamless and effortless

• Drive operational excellence through automation, monitoring improvements, and runbook development — reducing operational toil and improving mean time to resolution

• Collaborate with partner teams across Amazon to drive credential migration and adoption goals

• Troubleshoot and resolve complex distributed systems issues across multiple layers of the stack

• Participate in on-call rotations and contribute to incident response, root cause analysis, and corrective action follow-through

• Contribute to system design and architecture decisions, ensuring long-term scalability and maintainability

• Leverage AI tooling to improve engineering productivity, automate workflows, and raise the bar on operational efficiency

• Raise the bar for engineering quality through thorough code reviews, testing practices, and technical documentation

About the team

The AWS Credentials Distribution Systems (CreDS) team sits within AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) - the backbone of cloud security at Amazon. We own tier-0 services that distribute and manage ephemeral, least-privilege credentials across AWS compute platforms and Amazon's internal infrastructure.

We hold a high bar for system reliability, security, and scalability — backed by rigorous operational practices, thorough code reviews, and a bias toward automation. When an issue arises, we own it, learn from it, and build mechanisms to prevent it from recurring.

Basic Qualifications

• 3+ years of non-internship professional software development experience

• 2+ years of non-internship design or architecture (design patterns, reliability and scaling) of new and existing systems experience

• 1+ years of software development engineer or related occupational experience

• 1+ years of designing and developing large-scale, multi-tiered, multi-threaded, embedded or distributed software applications, tools, systems, and services using: C#, C++, Java, or Perl experience

• 1+ years of Object Oriented Design experience

• Bachelor's degree or foreign equivalent in Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics, or a related field

• Experience programming with at least one software programming language

Preferred Qualifications

• 3+ years of full software development life cycle, including coding standards, code reviews, source control management, build processes, testing, and operations experience

• Bachelor's degree in computer science or equivalent

Amazon is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of protected veteran status, disability, or other legally protected status.

Our inclusive culture empowers Amazonians to deliver the best results for our customers. If you have a disability and need a workplace accommodation or adjustment during the application and hiring process, including support for the interview or onboarding process, please visit https://amazon.jobs/content/en/how-we-hire/accommodations for more information. If the country/region you’re applying in isn’t listed, please contact your Recruiting Partner.

The base salary range for this position is listed below. Your Amazon package will include sign-on payments and restricted stock units (RSUs). Final compensation will be determined based on factors including experience, qualifications, and location. Amazon also offers comprehensive benefits including health insurance (medical, dental, vision, prescription, Basic Life & AD&D insurance and option for Supplemental life plans, EAP, Mental Health Support, Medical Advice Line, Flexible Spending Accounts, Adoption and Surrogacy Reimbursement coverage), 401(k) matching, paid time off, and parental leave. Learn more about our benefits at https://amazon.jobs/en/benefits .

USA, WA, Seattle - 143,700.00 - 194,400.00 USD annually