AI Agent Engineer Intern (Payment Data Intelligence) - 2027 Summer

About the team

The USDS Payment team at TikTok builds the core payment capabilities supporting a smooth, secure, and reliable payment experience across the platform — spanning payment acquisition, disbursement, transaction monitoring, payment method management, FX conversion, accounting, and reconciliation.

Within this org, the Payment Data Intelligence team applies data science and machine learning to improve payment services at scale. The team leverages large-scale datasets and advanced algorithms to power business-critical use cases including financial risk control, payment compliance, user growth, and operational optimization — at the intersection of ML, data infrastructure, and real-world fintech challenges.

This internship focuses on building agent-first AI applications for payment scenarios. The role is designed for candidates who want to apply the latest AI paradigms, including LLM-based agents, workflow orchestration, prompt engineering, MCP-based tool integration, and AI application evaluation, to solve practical payment business problems. Our internship program offers students hands-on experience, industry exposure, and opportunities to apply their knowledge to real-world challenges while building a strong foundation for personal and professional growth.

Interns will gain practical experience, explore potential career paths, and participate in social events, learning programs, and development workshops alongside industry professionals.

Responsibilities

• Understand payment business scenarios and transform them into AI-first agentic applications based on the latest AI paradigms.
• Work with product, strategy, engineering, and data teams to identify high-value AI use cases across risk control, compliance, operations, user growth, and payment intelligence.
• Design and develop agent orchestration workflows, including task decomposition, tool selection, memory/context design, human-in-the-loop checkpoints, and failure handling.
• Implement agent workflows visually on Agent Platform or programmatically using LangGraph-like scripts, depending on the use case and production requirements.

Qualifications

Minimum Qualification(s):

• Currently pursuing a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Software Engineering, or a related technical field.
• Able to commit to a 12-week internship during Summer 2027.
• Strong programming skills in Python; experience with Java, Scala, or TypeScript is a plus.
• Solid understanding of LLMs, agentic AI concepts, prompt engineering, retrieval-augmented generation, or AI application development.

Preferred Qualification(s):

• Currently pursuing a Master's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Software Engineering, or a related technical field.
• Familiarity with large-scale data tools such as SQL, Hive, Spark, or related data processing systems is a plus.
• Experience in fintech, payment systems, financial risk, compliance, trust and safety, recommendation systems, or operational automation is a plus.

About USDS

TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC is dedicated to the safety and security of millions of Americans who create, discover, and connect with what they love on the apps we operate. The Joint Venture has been established in compliance with the Executive Order signed by President Trump on September 25, 2025. Our foundation is a comprehensive data privacy and cybersecurity program we operate under defined safeguards to protect national security and secure U.S. user data, apps and the algorithm. We safeguard the U.S. content ecosystem, holding decision-making authority for trust and safety policies and moderation.

USDS Joint Venture helps ensure Americans can continue to express their creativity, discover new hobbies and interests, and build thriving communities and businesses on a global scale. On-site presence across teams allows the company to operate with greater speed, alignment, and agility — especially in areas like real-time decision-making, team development, and integrated execution. As such, the company is shifting from a hybrid work model to a fully in-person schedule up to 5 days a week.

Why Join Us

Inspiring creativity is at the core of TikTok's mission. Our innovative product is built to help people authentically express themselves, discover and connect — and our global, diverse teams make that possible. Together, we create value for our communities, inspire creativity and bring joy — a mission we work towards every day.

We strive to do great things with great people. We lead with curiosity, humility, and a desire to make impact in a rapidly growing tech company. Every challenge is an opportunity to learn and innovate as one team. We're resilient and embrace challenges as they come. By constantly iterating and fostering an "Always Day 1" mindset, we achieve meaningful breakthroughs for ourselves, our company, and our users. When we create and grow together, the possibilities are limitless.

Pay

The hourly rate range for this position in the selected city is $42.75.

Benefits

• Day one access to health insurance, life insurance, wellbeing benefits, and more.
• 10 paid holidays per year and paid sick time (56 hours if hired in first half of year, 40 if hired in second half of year).
• Interns who are not working 100% remote may also be eligible for housing allowance.

Schedule

This is a 12-week internship during Summer 2027, with a fully in-person schedule up to 5 days a week.