Systems Security Engineer

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Location: Phoenix, AZ

Company Stage of Funding: Early-Stage / Defense Technology Startup

Office Type: Onsite, Full-Time

Salary: Competitive (based on experience)

Security Clearance: Ability to obtain U.S. Secret clearance required

We’re representing a defense technology company building autonomous swarm systems designed for demanding national security environments. Their fleet of autonomous unmanned ground vehicles operates across embedded, edge, and cloud environments, combining GPU-accelerated computing, secure communications, and distributed fleet management infrastructure.

The company is scaling rapidly and building its security posture from first principles. Security is not an afterthought — it is core to the product. This role will sit at the center of ensuring resilience, compliance, and mission readiness across embedded platforms, vehicle-to-cloud communications, and cloud-hosted services.

As a Systems Security Engineer
, you will own and execute the company’s end-to-end security strategy across embedded systems, cloud infrastructure, and compliance programs. This is a hands‑on individual contributor role with full ownership of technical security architecture and operational execution.

You will:

• Design and implement secure system architectures across embedded platforms, GPU‑accelerated systems, and cloud‑hosted services.
• Architect and enforce cloud security controls (IAM, network segmentation, encryption, multi‑tenancy, and zero‑trust patterns).
• Secure embedded systems including secure boot, trusted execution environments, firmware security, key management, and hardware security modules.
• Protect heterogeneous CPU/GPU systems (e.g., NVIDIA Jetson‑class platforms).
• Secure vehicle‑to‑cloud communications and distributed system protocols.
• Conduct threat modeling, vulnerability analysis, and system‑level security assessments.
• Implement continuous monitoring, vulnerability tracking, and remediation processes.
• Lead compliance and accreditation activities, including preparation of documentation for Authority to Operate (ATO).
• Align systems with federal cybersecurity frameworks such as NIST, FISMA, and CMMC.
• Brief security architectures and compliance status to government stakeholders and leadership.
• Coordinate security incident response activities.
• Establish internal security policies and scalable monitoring processes as the company grows.

This role requires building systems and processes from scratch in a fast‑paced startup environment where execution and ownership are critical.

The ideal candidate is a technically deep security engineer who thrives in complex cyber‑physical systems and defense environments.

• 6+ years of experience in systems security engineering or cybersecurity.
• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Cybersecurity, or related field.
• Experience securing complex embedded systems, including firmware, hardware security modules, and key management.
• Experience designing security architectures for cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP).
• Strong network security fundamentals (firewalls, VPNs, TLS/mTLS, secure communications, zero‑trust models).
• Experience securing distributed systems and vehicle‑to‑cloud communication pipelines.
• Experience conducting vulnerability analysis and system‑level security assessments.
• Experience supporting compliance and accreditation processes, including ATO preparation.
• Working knowledge of federal cybersecurity frameworks (NIST, FISMA, CMMC, etc.).
• Ability to obtain and maintain a U.S. Secret security clearance.
• Strong communication skills and ability to operate as the primary security owner.
• Comf…