Principal Engineer Software Security Hybrid

Cisco•San Jose, NC

14h•Hybrid

About The Position

As a Principal Engineer on Cisco’s AI Security team, you will serve as a senior technical authority shaping security standards for AI capabilities delivered to customers, partners, and internal users. The AI Security team defines and validates security standards for AI embedded in Cisco products, AI-assisted development, and AI used in internal business operations. You will define and evolve threat models, architecture patterns, and security requirements for AI-native features; establish security standards for coding assistants and agent-authored code; and lead secure architecture reviews and reusable patterns across Cisco platforms. You will own coverage for adversarial and supply-chain risks, advance AI red-teaming and evaluation practices, and help establish post-deployment standards and incident criteria for AI-specific failure modes. The role partners with senior engineering leadership across CX, Operations, and Product, as well as product security, AI platform, SecOps, privacy, and legal. It calls for translating technical security requirements into business outcomes and driving standards through expertise and influence across a large, matrixed organization, without direct reports. This is a hybrid role.

Requirements

12+ years of experience in software security.
Deep, hands-on experience architecting and securing AI/ML-integrated systems, including Python, CI/CD automation, evaluation harnesses, agentic workflows, and security tooling.
Proven ability to secure AI models and applications, including LLM- and agentic-AI-related vulnerabilities such as prompt injection, excessive agency, and data leakage, as well as data privacy concerns.
Strong background in threat modeling, secure software development lifecycles (SDLC), and architecture validation for large-scale, multi-platform ecosystems.
Experience quantifying security risk and providing clear, authoritative technical guidance to product managers and engineering leads across multiple teams or business units.
Ability to operate as a principal-level technical authority without direct reports, driving outcomes through expertise, codified standards, and influence across a large, matrixed organization.

Nice To Haves

Experience securing autonomous agents, tool-calling, multi-agent orchestration, and MCP-style integrations.
Experience designing or running red-team/evaluation programs for AI systems, including adversarial testing and release-gate criteria.
Deep understanding of AI safety, ethical AI, and global data protection regulations as they apply to cloud-based SaaS and AI-embedded offerings.
Familiarity with emerging AI governance and risk frameworks such as NIST AI RMF and ISO/IEC 42001.
Experience building security standards or playbooks that scale through a distributed network of embedded security practitioners rather than through direct review alone.
Experience integrating security checkpoints into high-velocity CI/CD pipelines, including policy-as-code, automated security gates, agentic security workflows, and AI-assisted review and remediation loops.
Track record of mentoring senior-level engineers and fostering a security-first culture within high-performing technical teams.

Responsibilities

Define and evolve AI security threat models, architecture patterns, and requirements for AI-native features, including RAG hardening, tool-call governance, agent identity, bounded autonomy, approval flows, auditability, and human accountability.
Set security standards for coding assistants and agent-authored code, including provenance, human review, accountability, and automated SDLC/CI/CD security gates.
Provide architectural leadership for secure AI across Cisco platforms by leading design reviews, codifying reusable patterns, and defining measurable release criteria.
Own abuse and adversarial case coverage, including data poisoning, model extraction, model inversion, membership inference, insecure output handling, and RAG compromise.
Address model and data supply-chain provenance across models, datasets, plugins, fine-tuning data, and external APIs.
Advance red-teaming strategy, evaluation harnesses, and release checkpoints for AI capabilities; partner on post-deployment standards and incident criteria for AI-specific failure modes.
Advise senior engineering leadership across CX, Operations, and Product, and align with product security, AI platform, SecOps, privacy, and legal.
Translate sophisticated security requirements into business outcomes and drive adoption of security standards through influence across a large, matrixed organization.

Benefits

Medical, dental, and vision insurance, subject to plan eligibility rules.
401(k) plan with a Cisco matching contribution.
Paid parental leave.
Short- and long-term disability coverage.
Basic life insurance.
Cisco restricted stock unit grants may be available, subject to continued-employment vesting conditions.
Paid holidays and a floating holiday for non-exempt employees.
Paid birthday time off, year-end holiday shutdown, and paid personal wellness days.
Paid vacation or flexible vacation time off, depending on employee classification.
Paid sick time and carryover of unused sick time, subject to the described policy.
Additional paid time away may be requested for critical or emergency family issues.
Optional paid volunteer days.
Annual bonuses for non-sales roles, subject to Cisco policies.