Staff Software Engineer, Platform Cryptography

ServiceNow•Santa Clara, CA

About The Position

ServiceNow’s Platform Security team builds foundational security infrastructure and AI-driven detection systems for enterprise-scale operations. The Cryptography team owns the cryptographic backbone of the ServiceNow platform across certificate lifecycle, key management, secrets distribution, and workload identity for a SaaS platform. The role focuses on architecting and delivering enterprise-scale security solutions that integrate cryptographic systems with machine learning, reasoning engines, and real-time inference. The engineer will design and operate intelligent security systems for key management, PKI, and secrets infrastructure at SaaS scale, while providing technical leadership and hands-on engineering. The role includes building compliant, reliable cryptographic services; owning Kubernetes-hosted services end to end; applying threat modeling and security-first design; evaluating appropriate uses of AI/ML in security; collaborating across product, security, and platform teams; mentoring engineers; and staying current with cryptographic developments, including post-quantum readiness.

Requirements

At least 8 years of professional software engineering experience building and operating large-scale, production-grade applications and services.
Strong proficiency in Java, Go, Python, Node.js, or another strongly typed programming language used at production scale.
Experience developing modern web applications and platforms using frameworks such as React, Angular, or Vue.
Strong computer science fundamentals, including data structures, algorithms, object-oriented design, and distributed-systems tradeoffs.
Experience designing and implementing APIs and service integrations using REST, GraphQL, and modern backend architectures.
Hands-on experience with SQL and NoSQL databases in high-scale, cloud-native environments.
Experience building and operating services on Kubernetes, including deployments, Helm, CI/CD, observability, and multi-tenant SaaS environments.
Experience with public cloud platforms such as AWS, Azure, and/or GCP.
Proficiency with DevOps and platform engineering practices and tools, including Docker, Kubernetes, GitHub Actions, Jenkins, ArgoCD, and infrastructure automation.
Experience using AI-powered developer tools such as GitHub Copilot, Cursor, Codeium, or similar solutions.
Familiarity with building or integrating applications using AI and LLM platforms, including OpenAI, Anthropic, or comparable foundation-model APIs.
Working understanding of cryptographic primitives, including symmetric and asymmetric encryption, hashing, digital signatures, and TLS/PKI fundamentals.
Security-first engineering habits, including secure coding, threat modeling, vulnerability management, and rigorous code review.

Nice To Haves

Direct experience in cryptography, PKI, key management, or secrets management.
Experience with certificate lifecycle systems, HSM/KMS integration, or crypto-agility work.
Hands-on AI/ML exposure.
Experience applying ML to security or operations problems, such as anomaly detection, risk scoring, or log and telemetry analysis, or critically integrating LLM tooling into engineering workflows.
Experience in regulated environments, such as FIPS 140-2/3, FedRAMP, Common Criteria, or similar.
Exposure to post-quantum cryptography.
Track record of mentoring engineers and raising a team’s security standards.

Responsibilities

Design, build, and maintain scalable, secure cryptographic services that meet FIPS compliance and regulated-environment requirements.
Architect and operate mission-critical cryptographic services, prioritizing reliability and security.
Own services end to end on Kubernetes in a multi-tenant SaaS environment, including deployment, scaling, on-call duties, and incident response.
Threat model features and bring a security mindset to design reviews.
Evaluate appropriate applications of AI/ML in cryptography and security, such as key-usage anomaly detection, certificate lifecycle risk scoring, and code review for cryptographic anti-patterns.
Collaborate with product owners, security architects, and platform teams to translate compliance and security requirements into cryptographic frameworks.
Mentor engineers on secure coding, cryptographic pitfalls, and rigorous design reviews.
Track cryptographic advancements, including post-quantum readiness, and proactively bring relevant developments to the team.
Build and operate production-grade applications and services, APIs, and integrations in cloud-native environments.
Use AI-powered developer tools and modern AI or LLM platforms in engineering workflows where useful.