It was around Christmas time in 2014 when Allan Lorraine says he met up with a “friend of a friend” in a Sydney pub to talk the big business of big data.
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A former Lexus sales manager turned consultant and business coach, Mr Lorraine didn't know much about analysing large amounts of information.
But it turns out the friend of the friend, an engineer named Alex Tayler, was well versed.
On Wednesday, Dr Tayler took over one the most controversial jobs in the world when he was appointed acting chief executive of British-based firm Cambridge Analytica. Cambridge is the firm at the heart of a global data scandal involving undercover video tapes, 50 million Facebook accounts and a US election.
The company is under scrutiny after a whistleblower alleged massive privacy breaches and a series of recordings appeared to show senior executives boasting of nefarious influence.
Dr Tayler’s predecessor, Alexander Nix, has been suspended “pending a full, independent investigation,” the company’s board said in a statement.
The scandal has attracted worldwide attention but until now Dr Tayler's close ties to Australia have not been revealed.
Dr Tayler completed a chemical engineering degree at the University of Newcastle in 2007. He moved to England on a scholarship to study for a PhD at Cambridge and became a researcher in magnetic resonance imaging, as well as working for energy companies Orica and Schlumberger.
The conditions of the scholarship require holders to either be an Australian citizen or permanent resident.
Dr Tayler returned to Australia on at least one occasion to visit family, according to Mr Lorraine. This was when the two men caught up in Sydney pub in 2014. The meeting included a discussion about setting up an Australian expansion, Mr Lorraine said.
“I’m not a data analytics person by any stretch of the imagination,” he said. “I was engaged by another client of mine to find someone who could crunch big data and extrapolate big data."
It was then that he came into contact with Dr Tayler and Cambridge Analytica, he said.
“They approached me to be a referral partner for Australia.”
The data firm was "playing with the psychology of an entire nation," by harvesting and using over 50 million Facebook user's private information for Trump's presidential campaign, says whistleblower Christopher Wylie.
Mr Lorraine said in the negotiations with Cambridge Analytica he not only met with Dr Tayler but Skyped with the then boss Mr Nix, whom he found to be "very English, very professional, very proper".
“There was no reason to suspect there was anything other than an honourable businessperson,” he said.
The business name "Cambridge Analytica" was registered in Australia to the Lorraine Family Trust in June, 2015. The company's parent firm, SCL Group, promoted Mr Lorraine online as its head of Australian operations.
"Allan leads his business intelligence team with a focus on; Behavioural Micro-targeting, Behaviour Marketing, Big Data, Data Visualization, and Business Process Management Solutions," a website profile said.
But according to Mr Lorraine, no work was ever done.
Negotiations stalled and he was not even told about Mr Nix's trip to Australia last year.
Then-Liberal party director Tony Nutt had foreshadowed a meeting with the firm but both major political parties have denied engaging the company in any work.
“They got busy with the Trump campaign and I got busy with my things and nothing ever really happened," Mr Lorraine said.
It was "premature" for him to be advertised online as the head of a SCL Australia when it had not done any work, he said. The website profile has now been removed and the business name deregistered.
Early discussions with Cambridge Analytica had broached the possibility of conducting political, as well as commercial work, but Mr Lorraine said "I don’t have a political bone in my body."
His Facebook profile shows him to be a skier, an off-road caravan enthusiast and an appreciator of dad jokes.
Meanwhile, Dr Tayler has his work cut out for him. On an undercover video recordings released by the British Channel 4 News this week, he was heard discussing the ins and outs of US electioneering.
“When you think about the fact that Donald Trump lost the popular vote by 3 million votes but won the electoral college vote that’s down to the data and the research," he said.
