Staff Software Engineer, Security Engineering

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Okta is The World’s Identity Company. We free everyone to safely use any technology, anywhere, on any device or app. Our flexible and neutral products, Okta Platform and Auth0 Platform, provide secure access, authentication, and automation, placing identity at the core of business security and growth.

At Okta, we celebrate a variety of perspectives and experiences. We are not looking for someone who checks every single box - we’re looking for lifelong learners and people who can make us better with their unique experiences.

Join our team! We’re building a world where Identity belongs to you.

We are seeking a highly motivated Staff Software Engineer, Security Engineering to lead strategic initiatives in dependency vulnerability management and cloud-native security. This role requires technical expertise in remediating dependency vulnerabilities but also a proven ability to design, build, and deploy cutting-edge automation (including AI/ML/LLM solutions) to scale our remediation efforts. You will be a key driver in establishing security best practices for our containerized environments and maturing our overall security posture.

Key Responsibilities:

• Architect, develop, and deploy highly scalable security automation and tooling to significantly reduce Time-to-Remediate (TTR) identified risk.

• Lead the integration of advanced AI/ML capabilities into the vulnerability management lifecycle, focusing on automated vulnerability validation, intelligent patch suggestion, and PR generation for dependency remediation.

• Serve as a technical expert for complex dependency vulnerability triage and remediation, particularly for critical and zero-day issues identified by SCA tools.

• Establish patterns and best practices for the end-to-end remediation process, including analysis, automated PR creation, and validation testing.

• Drive the prioritization and remediation strategy across multiple engineering teams and product lines.

• Design, implement, and govern the process for building and maintaining hardened container base images for development and production environments, focusing on minimizing attack surface.

• Provide technical guidance and engineering solutions for securing Kubernetes (K8s) and containerized workloads, including runtime security, network policies, and admission controllers.

• Contribute significantly to the overall Security Engineering roadmap and strategy.

• Provide consultation on application security architecture and design to engineering leadership.

• Demonstrated success through cross functional collaboration and team work, ability to drive solutions beyond their individual contribution.

Our Ideal Candidate Will Have:

• Deep, proven experience with container security, including designing and deploying hardened container images and securing Kubernetes clusters.

• Expert-level proficiency in Software Composition Analysis (SCA) and hands-on experience in the practical remediation of third-party and open-source dependency vulnerabilities at scale.

• Strong practical experience in building and operating security automation, with development expertise in languages like Go and/or Python

• Expertise in using GitHub, and CI/CD systems (GitHub Actions, Jenkins) from an architectural and engineering perspective.

• Proficient in application security principles, secure code review, and the OWASP Top 10.

• Direct experience or strong conceptual understanding of applying AI/ML, Large Language Models (LLMs), or MCP techniques to security challenges (e.g., automated vulnerability fixing, intelligent alert grouping).

• Expert familiarity with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure) and their security services, with a focus on container orchestration.

Nice to Have:

• Experience with Infrastructure as Code (IaC) tools, especially Terraform, for provisioning security controls.

• Published research, talks, or contributions to open-source security projects.

• Experience with supply chain security frameworks (e.g., SLSA).

• Advanced knowledge of Application security (OWASP Top 10).

Hybrid #LI-Hybrid

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What you can look forward to as a Full-Time Okta employee!

• Amazing Benefits

• Making Social Impact

• Developing Talent and Fostering Connection + Community at Okta

Okta cultivates a dynamic work environment, providing the best tools, technology and benefits to empower our employees to work productively in a setting that best and uniquely suits their needs. Each organization is unique in the degree of flexibility and mobility in which they work so that all employees are enabled to be their most creative and successful versions of themselves, regardless of where they live. Find your place at Okta today! https://www.okta.com/company/careers/.

Some roles may require travel to one of our office locations for in-person onboarding.

Okta is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, ancestry, marital status, age, physical or mental disability, or status as a protected veteran. We also consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and convictions records, consistent with applicable laws.

If reasonable accommodation is needed to complete any part of the job application, interview process, or onboarding please use this Form to request an accommodation.

Okta is committed to complying with applicable data privacy and security laws and regulations. For more information, please see our Personnel and Job Candidate Privacy Notice at https://www.okta.com/legal/personnel-policy/.