Vimal is available for hire

Vimal Paliwal

Verified Expert in Engineering

DevSecOps Engineer and Software Developer

Location

London, United Kingdom

Toptal Member Since

April 27, 2020

Vim is a DevSecOps practitioner and AWS Community Builder with over seven years of professional experience. Over the years, he has architected and implemented full-fledged solutions for clients using AWS, Kubernetes, Terraform, Python, Shell, Prometheus, and more, keeping security as an utmost priority. Additionally, as an AWS Authorized Instructor, Vim has trained people from startups to Fortune companies for over two years.

Cloud Infrastructure AWS DevOps Infrastructure as Code (IaC)DevOps Amazon Web Services (AWS)Terraform Amazon RDS Amazon API Gateway Bash Docker AWS Lambda Shell Amazon EKS Jenkins Kubernetes

Portfolio

McKinsey & Company

Amazon Web Services (AWS), Kubernetes, Terraform, CI/CD Pipelines, Scripting...

Modus Create

Shell, Terraform, Python, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Shell Scripting...

Pricemoov SaaS

Amazon Web Services (AWS), Helm, Kubernetes, Amazon RDS, CircleCI, Docker...

Experience

DevOps - 6 years Amazon Web Services (AWS) - 6 years CI/CD Pipelines - 6 years Terraform - 5 years Python - 3 years Docker - 3 years Shell - 2 years Kubernetes - 1 year

Availability

Full-time

Preferred Environment

Terraform, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Kubernetes, CI/CD Pipelines, Helm

The most amazing...

...thing I've done is independently build a payment portal surrounded by a suite of services and see client payments going through.

Work Experience

Principal Engineer

2022 - PRESENT

McKinsey & Company

Established the cloud infrastructure on AWS single-handedly from the ground up for a single-tenant application, demonstrating strong technical expertise in cloud architecture, security implementation, and performance optimization in the initial stage.
Developed and implemented Infrastructure as Code (IaC) practices in Terraform, streamlining the provisioning and management of cloud resources in multiple regions.
Provided technical leadership and mentorship to junior team members upon their onboarding and regular training sessions, enabling them to contribute effectively to projects.
Implemented DevSecOps practices by integrating tools such as Checkov, Semgrep, and Trivy.
Led the implementation of foreign data wrapper and migration to Graviton, reducing database cost around 70%.

Technologies: Amazon Web Services (AWS), Kubernetes, Terraform, CI/CD Pipelines, Scripting, AWS Key Management Service (KMS), Amazon CloudHSM, Web Application Firewall (WAF), Amazon CloudFront CDN, SFTP, AWS Lambda, Amazon RDS, Docker, DevOps, Amazon EKS, Git, Amazon API Gateway, Amazon Elastic Container Service (Amazon ECS), AWS Certified Solution Architect, Linux, Infrastructure as Code (IaC), Bash, Cloud Infrastructure, AWS DevOps

DevOps Engineer

2020 - 2022

Modus Create

Migrated EKS clusters singlehandedly to the latest available version for stage and production environment with zero downtime.
Wrote shell and Python scripts for GitLab CI/CD to maintain a dynamic development environment.
Carried out a cost analysis and reduced the monthly AWS bill by nearly 40% by introducing Spot instances for the dev environment and downsizing underutilized ElastiCache and Aurora clusters.
Implemented an RDS Proxy with IAM authentication to securely and efficiently manage database connections.
Replaced instance-level IAM roles with pod level using K8s ServiceAccount to achieve least privilege access.
Hardened all EKS nodes by introducing CIS Level 1 AMI.
Automated security patch on EKS nodes every weekend via AWS Systems Manager.
Implemented Prometheus and Grafana for K8s monitoring using Helm charts.
Set up site-to-site VPN connectivity for seamless on-prem connectivity.

Technologies: Shell, Terraform, Python, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Shell Scripting, GitLab CI/CD, Kubernetes, Amazon RDS, Docker, DevOps, Amazon EKS, Git, Amazon API Gateway, Amazon Elastic Container Service (Amazon ECS), AWS Certified Solution Architect, Linux, Infrastructure as Code (IaC), Bash, Cloud Infrastructure, AWS DevOps, CI/CD Pipelines

DevOps Engineer

2020 - 2020

Pricemoov SaaS

Improved the existing CI/CD pipeline to include the deployment of Lambda@Edge function using SLS framework and updated CloudFront with the latest deployed version.
Implemented RabbitMQ broker for Celery workers via Helm Chart.
Separated the Celery worker and Redis container from the back-end app container on K8s.

Technologies: Amazon Web Services (AWS), Helm, Kubernetes, Amazon RDS, CircleCI, Docker, DevOps, Amazon EKS, Git, AWS Certified Solution Architect, Linux, Infrastructure as Code (IaC), Bash, Cloud Infrastructure, AWS DevOps, CI/CD Pipelines

Cloud Lead

2018 - 2020

Coditas

Automated the infrastructure deployment of a centralized logging framework, which includes Kinesis Firehose, S3, SQS, SNS, ELK, API Gateway, and Lambda using Terraform.
Wrote custom RBAC roles for limiting user access to the Kubernetes cluster.
Used Jira to keep track of issues/tasks along with time logging.
Implemented a host monitoring solution using Sensu Core and Grafana.
Automated the code deployment to EC2 instances using Jenkins Pipeline script in combination with AWS CodeDeploy.
Handled the infrastructure and code deployment automation of a serverless application involving S3, CloudFront, Lambda, API Gateway, DynamoDB, and more using Terraform and GitLab CI/CD.

Technologies: Shell, Terraform, Python, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Shell Scripting, Kubernetes, Jenkins, Amazon RDS, CircleCI, Docker, DevOps, Amazon EKS, Git, Amazon API Gateway, Amazon Elastic Container Service (Amazon ECS), AWS Certified Solution Architect, Linux, Infrastructure as Code (IaC), Bash, Cloud Infrastructure, AWS DevOps, CI/CD Pipelines

Founder

2016 - 2017

Ezstrax

Built a payment gateway surrounded with a suite of services such as invoicing, form creation, or multi-cart options.
Used Terraform to automate the infrastructure and AWS CodeBuild and CodeDeploy for the CI/CD pipeline.
Guided infrastructure to pass its ASV scan in the very first run.

Technologies: Terraform, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Amazon RDS, Git, Amazon API Gateway, Infrastructure as Code (IaC), Cloud Infrastructure, AWS DevOps, CI/CD Pipelines

Experience

AWS IAM Key Rotator

https://github.com/skildops/aws-iam-key-rotator

This tool is responsible for generating a new IAM access key pair every X days and mails it to the user via SES. It will also delete the existing key pair after a few days of new key generation to allow the user to update the new key wherever required.

Terrablocks

https://github.com/terrablocks

Modular infrastructure blocks written in Terraform. This project contains a few basic infrastructure building blocks required to start most of the projects. I maintain this to make my and others' lives easier.

Secureaws

https://github.com/paliwalvimal/secureaws

A Python application that will scan your AWS account to identify whether basic security services are enabled. If not, the app will help you enable or set them up.
Services covered include:
• CloudTrail
• Config
• Root MFA
• VPC flow logs
• Strong password policy
• Macie
• Guard duty
• S3 SSE encryption
• EBS encryption

Payment Gateway

A Java application helping people and businesses to collect payments online. Payments can be collected via creating an invoice using the portal or by creating interactive forms for users. I was responsible for building the application, hosting it, and keeping it secured.

Publication

SSH Logging and Session Management Using AWS SSM

https://www.toptal.com/aws/ssh-log-with-ssm

Skills

Tools

Terraform, Amazon EKS, Jenkins, Shell, Amazon Elastic Container Service (Amazon ECS), Helm, AWS IAM, Amazon Simple Email Service (SES), Amazon CloudWatch, GitLab CI/CD, Git, AWS Key Management Service (KMS), Amazon CloudFront CDN, CircleCI

Paradigms

DevOps

Platforms

Amazon Web Services (AWS), AWS Lambda, Kubernetes, Docker, Linux

Other

CI/CD Pipelines, Infrastructure as Code (IaC), Cloud Infrastructure, AWS DevOps, Amazon API Gateway, Amazon RDS, AWS Certified Solution Architect, Shell Scripting, Scripting, Amazon CloudHSM, Web Application Firewall (WAF), SFTP

Languages

Bash, Python

Storage

Amazon DynamoDB

Education

2014 - 2015

Master's Degree in Computer & Network Security

Middlesex University - London, UK

2011 - 2014

Bachelor's Degree in Computer Applications

MITSOM College - Pune, India

Certifications

DECEMBER 2023 - DECEMBER 2026

Certified Kubernetes Administrator

CNCF

JANUARY 2021 - JULY 2022

AWS Authorized Instructor - Champion

Amazon Web Services

DECEMBER 2019 - DECEMBER 2025

AWS Certified Solution Architect – Professional

Amazon Web Services

FEBRUARY 2019 - FEBRUARY 2025

AWS Certified Security – Specialty

Amazon Web Services

AUGUST 2018 - AUGUST 2024

AWS Certified Developer – Associate

Amazon Web Services

DECEMBER 2017 - DECEMBER 2024

AWS Certified SysOps Administrator – Associate

Amazon Web Services

JUNE 2017 - DECEMBER 2025

AWS Certified Solution Architect – Associate

Amazon Web Services

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