SIEM Engineer

SAIC•Washington, DC

18h•Hybrid

About The Position

SAIC is seeking a SIEM Engineer to support enterprise cybersecurity operations and modernize an agency’s security monitoring and analytics capabilities. The role administers, engineers, and optimizes enterprise Security Information and Event Management platforms in a mission-critical federal environment. The successful candidate combines hands-on SIEM administration with engineering and architectural knowledge, independently troubleshoots complex technical problems, improves platform performance and reliability, and contributes to scalable SIEM solutions. The position is hybrid, with three days onsite and two days remote. The engineer supports enterprise SIEM platforms, including Splunk Enterprise, Splunk ES, and Elastic / Elastic Security, and contributes to a transition from Splunk to Elastic. Work includes managing telemetry ingestion and normalization, developing searches and detections, monitoring platform health, supporting security and lifecycle requirements, collaborating with cybersecurity and infrastructure stakeholders, and documenting technical solutions. The position requires strong analytical skills, initiative, technical curiosity, and a commitment to continuous improvement.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree in Cybersecurity, Computer Science, Information Systems, Engineering, or a related technical discipline, or equivalent relevant IT/cybersecurity experience.
9+ years of relevant IT or cybersecurity experience, including at least 3 years of hands-on SIEM administration, engineering, or enterprise logging experience.
Ability to obtain and maintain a Public Trust requiring U.S. Citizenship.
Demonstrated experience administering, engineering, or troubleshooting enterprise SIEM platforms, with hands-on experience in Splunk Enterprise and working knowledge of Elastic or comparable search and analytics technologies.
Strong understanding of SIEM architecture, distributed systems, enterprise logging, data ingestion, parsing, normalization, indexing, retention, and performance optimization.
Proficiency with Splunk Search Processing Language (SPL), working knowledge of SQL, and familiarity with Elastic query technologies such as KQL, ES|QL, EQL, or Query DSL.
Experience onboarding and troubleshooting enterprise data sources, including Windows/Linux systems, network devices, security appliances, applications, and cloud environments.
Strong Linux and Windows administration skills, including working knowledge of networking, TCP/IP, DNS, HTTP/HTTPS, TLS, syslog, and related protocols.
Experience with scripting or automation using Python, PowerShell, Bash, REST APIs, or comparable technologies.
Familiarity with enterprise cybersecurity technologies such as EDR, firewalls, IDS/IPS, identity systems, vulnerability management, and security monitoring platforms.
Demonstrated ability to independently investigate complex technical problems, analyze data, identify root causes, and develop practical engineering solutions.
Strong technical curiosity, initiative, accountability, and ability to learn new technologies while adapting to evolving enterprise requirements.
Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to document technical solutions and collaborate effectively with technical teams and leadership.

Nice To Haves

Hands-on experience with Elastic Stack / Elastic Security, including Elasticsearch, Kibana, Elastic Agent/Fleet, Beats, Logstash, and Elastic query technologies.
Experience with distributed or cloud-based SIEM architectures, including clustering, high availability, disaster recovery, storage optimization, and capacity planning.
Experience supporting enterprise SIEM migrations, particularly Splunk-to-Elastic, including data source migration, detection migration, and operational validation.
Advanced experience with Splunk Enterprise / Splunk ES, including distributed architectures, CIM, search optimization, and platform administration.
Experience with security detection engineering, correlation rules, alert tuning, MITRE ATT&CK, or security analytics development.
Familiarity with configuration management, Infrastructure-as-Code, Git, CI/CD, and automated platform deployments.
Experience supporting cybersecurity operations within federal environments and familiarity with NIST, FISMA, OMB, and FedRAMP requirements.
Relevant technical certifications such as Splunk Enterprise Certified Admin, Splunk Enterprise Certified Architect, Elastic Certified Engineer, Security+, CISSP, or comparable certifications.

Responsibilities

Administer, maintain, engineer, and optimize enterprise SIEM platforms, including Splunk Enterprise, Splunk ES, and Elastic / Elastic Security, ensuring availability, performance, reliability, and scalability.
Support SIEM architecture and modernization initiatives, including the transition from Splunk to Elastic, migration of data sources and security use cases, infrastructure design, testing, validation, and operational cutover.
Design, configure, manage, and troubleshoot enterprise log collection and ingestion pipelines, including syslog, Windows Event Collection/Forwarding, SIEM agents and forwarders, network devices, security technologies, applications, databases, and cloud services.
Onboard and normalize security telemetry, ensuring accurate collection, parsing, enrichment, indexing, retention, and searchability using applicable standards such as Splunk Common Information Model (CIM) and Elastic Common Schema (ECS).
Develop, maintain, migrate, and optimize SIEM searches, dashboards, reports, alerts, correlation rules, and security detections using SPL, SQL, and Elastic query technologies.
Monitor and optimize SIEM infrastructure health, ingestion performance, storage utilization, system capacity, and data availability while supporting high availability, disaster recovery, and scalability requirements.
Troubleshoot complex SIEM and logging issues across the complete data path, identify root causes, and implement sustainable solutions to improve reliability and operational effectiveness.
Support SIEM architecture, configuration management, security hardening, change control, automation, and platform lifecycle management in accordance with enterprise and federal requirements.
Collaborate with security analysts, infrastructure teams, application owners, and cybersecurity leadership to improve security visibility, detection capabilities, data quality, and operational reporting.
Develop and maintain technical documentation, including architecture diagrams, data flow diagrams, configuration standards, SOPs, and migration procedures, while providing technical guidance to other team members.
Evaluate emerging SIEM technologies and capabilities, identify opportunities for engineering improvements, and recommend solutions that improve performance, automation, scalability, and operational efficiency.
Take ownership of assigned technical initiatives, communicate progress and risks, and independently drive technical issues and projects through resolution.