Founding Member: Cybersecurity Research Engineer

(Remote / U.S.-Based — founding-member role) About Us AI Security Assurance is an early-stage, remote-first startup on a mission to accelerate the delivery of trustworthy systems — systems proven secure and safe by design. We build automated tooling for whole-system security and safety assurance: it analyzes a system as it's actually built — including the interactions between components, where the most damaging design-level flaws hide — and produces the evidence that trustworthy systems require. Our work is grounded in Systems-Theoretic Process Analysis (STPA) and formal methods for security, following the NIST systems security engineering framework (SP 800-160). We're bootstrapped and pre-funding, building toward funded government R&D (DARPA, SBIR) and a commercial platform. We're assembling a founding team — people who want skin in the game. The Opportunity — please read first This is a founding-member role, not a salaried job today. We're looking for someone to help us build the company and win the funded research contracts that pay for the work. In place of a salary now, founding members share in the upside through equity / ownership participation; when we land a contract that funds the role, that contract compensates the work. We're honest about the risk — there is no guarantee of funding — and we're looking for people who want to build something real and share in its success. The Role As a founding Cybersecurity Research Engineer, you'll lead the research that grounds our tooling in real systems — reverse engineering and binary analysis, vulnerability research, and recovering a system's true design from source and binaries so it can be analyzed at the system level. You'll connect low-level findings back to design-level security analysis, and help shape the research behind our proposals. Must-haves What We're Looking For Vulnerability research experience (discovering and analyzing real weaknesses)Reverse engineering and binary analysisStrong low-level skills — e.g., C/assembly, debuggers, disassemblers (Ghidra/IDA/Binary Ninja), and software/firmware internalsStatic and/or dynamic analysis of binaries and sourceAbility to work independently and wear multiple hats in an early-stage teamAbility to work in the U.S. without sponsorship; willingness/ability to obtain a U.S. security clearance for future government work Nice-to-haves AI / LLM familiarity and modern development tools (helpful, not the core job)Fuzzing, exploit development, or program-analysis toolingSTPA-Sec or threat-modeling exposure; mapping vulnerabilities to design weaknessesResearch, publications, CTF results, or published CVEs How To Apply Email careers@aisecurityassurance.com with your resume and a short note on what you've researched or broken (links, write-ups, CVEs, CTF profiles welcome), or apply via the form below. Transparency Note: This is a founding-member position, not a paid role at this time. AI Security Assurance is bootstrapped and actively pursuing funding. Founding members join now to help build the company and win funded research contracts, participating through equity/ownership rather than salary initially; paid compensation begins when a contract funds the role. There is no guarantee of funding. We're looking for committed teammates who want to help build — and share in — what comes next. EEO: Equal opportunity employer, including disability and protected veterans. AI Security Assurance operates a drug-free workplace.