IT Security Engineer - Computing Services

Carnegie Mellon University•Pittsburgh, PA

3d•Onsite

About The Position

Carnegie Mellon University’s Information Security Office is seeking an IT Security Engineer to help investigate and respond to security incidents across a large, diverse, and technically complex university environment. This is a hands-on security position with a strong focus on incident response, digital forensics, security monitoring, and technical investigation. You will use endpoint, network, application, identity, and other security data to determine what happened, understand the scope and impact of an incident, preserve and analyze evidence, contain threats, and help affected teams recover securely. The environment is broad, and investigations frequently involve unfamiliar systems or technologies. One incident may require analyzing an endpoint compromise, another may involve reconstructing activity from network traffic and logs, while another may require learning enough about an application, operating system, or protocol to understand unexpected behavior. You do not need to be an expert in every technology or security discipline described in this posting. We are looking for strong technical fundamentals, investigative ability, curiosity, sound judgment, clear communication, and the ability to learn unfamiliar systems when an investigation requires it. If you enjoy understanding how systems work beneath the surface, following evidence until you can explain what happened, considering systems from both attacker and defender perspectives, or building tools to answer questions that existing products cannot, you may be a strong fit for this team.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree or equivalent combination of education, technical training, professional certifications, and relevant experience.
Three or more years of relevant technical experience in information security, information technology, systems administration, networking, software engineering, infrastructure engineering, digital forensics, or a related technical discipline.
Hands-on experience with one or more major operating system environments such as Linux, Windows, or macOS.
Understanding of fundamental networking, operating system, and application concepts.
Ability to investigate technical problems methodically by gathering evidence, developing hypotheses, testing assumptions, and documenting conclusions.
Ability to analyze logs, system information, network activity, or other technical telemetry.
Ability to evaluate security threats and vulnerabilities in the context of a real environment.
Strong technical problem-solving skills.
Strong written and verbal communication skills.
Ability to work collaboratively with people representing a wide range of technical backgrounds.
Sound judgment when handling sensitive information and security incidents.
Ability to independently perform routine duties after appropriate onboarding and training and to recognize when additional expertise or escalation is required.
The successful candidate must qualify as a U.S. person under the applicable requirements governing this position.

Nice To Haves

Experience in one or more of the following areas is beneficial: Incident response and digital forensics, including host or network forensics, endpoint investigation, security monitoring, log analysis, threat hunting, malware analysis, or related investigative work.
Systems and network engineering, including Windows, Linux, macOS, TCP/IP networking, authentication systems, enterprise infrastructure, virtualization, cloud environments, or storage technologies.
Security operations, including endpoint detection and response, SIEM, network security monitoring, vulnerability management, certificate management, or data protection technologies.
Security assessment, including vulnerability assessment, penetration testing, application security, or evaluating systems from an adversarial perspective.
Automation and software development, including using Python, PowerShell, shell scripting, Go, Ruby, Perl, Java, C, C++, or other languages to process data, automate workflows, or create technical tools.
Digital evidence and legal support, including E-Discovery, evidence preservation, chain of custody, subpoena response, or interaction with law enforcement.
Working in higher education, research, or another large and decentralized computing environment.
Professional certifications such as CISSP, GSEC, GCFE, or other security and technology certifications are welcomed but are not required.

Responsibilities

Monitor and investigate alerts generated by network, endpoint, vulnerability, logging, and other security systems.
Triage reported or suspected security events and determine whether they represent security incidents.
Conduct technical investigations using endpoint artifacts, network traffic, system and application logs, identity information, and other available evidence.
Determine the likely root cause, scope, timeline, and impact of security incidents.
Perform or assist with host and network forensic analysis.
Identify affected systems, accounts, data, and infrastructure and recommend appropriate containment, eradication, and recovery actions.
Work directly with system administrators, network engineers, developers, application owners, researchers, and other members of the university community during investigations.
Clearly communicate technical findings, risk, and recommended actions to both technical and non-technical audiences.
Maintain accurate investigation records, evidence, timelines, findings, and incident documentation.
Collect and preserve digital evidence in support of security investigations and authorized legal matters.
Assist with E-Discovery, evidence preservation, chain-of-custody procedures, and other forensic requests when directed by university leadership or the Office of General Counsel.
Participate in a shared 24x7 on-call rotation supporting security monitoring, incident response, and security infrastructure.
Supporting vulnerability scanning and vulnerability management services.
Helping campus organizations understand and remediate security vulnerabilities.
Supporting endpoint security, endpoint detection and response, certificate authority, public key infrastructure, and data protection services.
Monitoring, configuring, evaluating, and improving systems used for security detection, investigation, assessment, and response.
Evaluating emerging vulnerabilities, attack techniques, and security threats for relevance to Carnegie Mellon’s environment.
Conducting or assisting with authorized security assessments and penetration testing of systems, networks, applications, and services.
Providing security guidance and technical consulting to teams across the university.
Researching, testing, and recommending new security tools and techniques.
Developing scripts, utilities, integrations, or other automation that make investigations and security operations more effective.
Creating documentation, technical guidance, and security communications.
Participating in other Information Security Office projects as needed.