Cyber Research Engineer

Key Responsibilities

• Lead and execute advanced offensive cyber research initiatives, including vulnerability discovery, exploit development across userland, kernel, and firmware layers, and the design of novel offensive capabilities.
• Design, develop, and maintain sophisticated, robust, and scalable offensive security software, tools, and frameworks, with an emphasis on low-level programming for diverse and potentially constrained environments (bare-metal, embedded, real-time systems).
• Conduct in-depth reverse engineering of binaries, firmware, and proprietary protocols to understand system behavior, identify vulnerabilities, analyze malware, and inform capability development.
• Prototype and iterate on tooling and methodologies in support of red teaming and Cyber Network Operations (CNO), including exploring automation and AI-driven techniques.
• Develop and implement software that can evade detection and maintain persistence on target systems.
• Analyze and model adversarial tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) to simulate real-world cyber threats and inform offensive and defensive strategies.
• Provide technical leadership and mentorship to junior engineers and peers on offensive cyber techniques, research methodologies, and software development best practices.
• Collaborate effectively with multidisciplinary teams (including hardware engineers, network analysts, defensive security, data scientists, and mission planners) to identify vulnerabilities, develop innovative techniques, and integrate research findings into operational platforms.
• Author comprehensive technical documentation, Concepts of Operations (CONOPs), and briefings for both highly technical and operational audiences.
• Contribute to strategic research initiatives and present findings at internal and external technical forums and conferences.
• Stay current with the latest developments in offensive cyber techniques, emerging threats, and relevant software technologies to continuously enhance capabilities and platform integration.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Cybersecurity, or a related technical field.
• 7+ years of experience in cybersecurity with a strong focus on offensive security research and software development in a security context.
• Expert-level proficiency in C/C++.
• Strong software development skills for building robust, maintainable, and sophisticated security tools and capabilities.
• Proficiency in additional relevant languages such as Python and Rust.
• Deep understanding of operating system internals (Linux, embedded RTOS, Android OS), computer architecture, and low-level programming concepts.
• Experience with kernel or hypervisor-level development.
• Extensive hands-on experience with industry-standard reverse engineering tools (e.g., IDA Pro, Ghidra, Binary Ninja, Jeorn) and techniques for analyzing binaries, firmware, and proprietary protocols.
• Demonstrated expertise in identifying, analyzing, and exploiting complex vulnerabilities (including memory corruption, privilege escalation, sandbox escapes) across multiple platforms, architectures (e.g., x86, ARM, MIPS, RISC-V, microcontrollers), and environments (modern OSes, embedded systems).
• Hands-on development experience for non-traditional or highly constrained targets.
• Strong understanding of network stack and protocols, security vulnerabilities, common attack methods, and experience with network protocol manipulation and covert communications.
• Familiarity with advanced adversarial cybersecurity strategies.
• Ability to effectively communicate complex technical information, research findings, and operational concepts both verbally and in writing to diverse audiences.
• Experience leading technical projects or mentoring junior engineers.