Director, Global Security Incident Response
Job Description
At Cloudflare, we are on a mission to help build a better Internet. Today the company runs one of the world’s largest networks that powers millions of websites and other Internet properties for customers ranging from individual bloggers to SMBs to Fortune 500 companies. Cloudflare protects and accelerates any Internet application online without adding hardware, installing software, or changing a line of code. Internet properties powered by Cloudflare all have web traffic routed through its intelligent global network, which gets smarter with every request. As a result, they see significant improvement in performance and a decrease in spam and other attacks. Cloudflare was named to Entrepreneur Magazine’s Top Company Cultures list and ranked among the World’s Most Innovative Companies by Fast Company.
At Cloudflare, we’re not looking for people who wait for a polished roadmap; we’re looking for the builders who see the cracks in the Internet that everyone else has simply learned to live with. We value candidates who have the instinct to spot a "normalized" problem and the AI-native curiosity to create a solution using the latest tools. Our culture is built on iteration, leveraging AI to ship faster today to make it better tomorrow, while ensuring that every improvement, no matter how small, is shared across the team to lift everyone up. If you’re the type of person who values curiosity over bureaucracy, and that AI is a partner in solving tough problems to keep the Internet moving forward, you’ll fit right in.
Available Locations: Austin, TX or New York, NY or San Francisco, CA
Our Mission
The Security Response Team’s mission is to systematically respond to security threats safeguarding Cloudflare. We operate 24/7 across the globe to respond to security incidents, continuously improve our response capabilities, lead digital investigations and enhance our overall security posture. Our “Cloudflare on Cloudflare”, data and automation first philosophy makes us a cohesive team with high impact.
The Role
As a Director of Global SIRT, you'll refine security processes, focusing on operations and incident response. Responsibilities span proactive threat management across edge, product, cloud, workloads, and containers. You'll lead a Global Security Response Team assessing critical security events through triage, cyber-attack analysis, scoping, containment, and forensics. You will help create scalable analysis processes and methods, build response frameworks, and collaborate with IT, Engineering, Product, and Legal teams. This role demands diverse technical skills, such as tooling development, automation, custom log analysis, a solid understanding of OS internals, and deep technical expertise in threat detection, incident analysis, forensics and SIEM systems.
Responsibilities
- Vital leader of the Security Incident Response team overseeing all operations around the Globe.
- Incident Response Oversight: Providing oversight to security incidents from detection to resolution, continuously looking to improve rapid response capabilities.
- Team Optimization and Agile Learning: Ensure optimal staffing and resourcing, focusing on continuous skill development and career progression within an agile security environment.
- Resource and Vendor Management: Working with Security leadership to ensure tooling and resources are available to incident response teams.
- Performance Engineering: Guide team performance, ensuring adherence to established SOPs and best practices in security integration.
- Strategic Communication Protocols: Manage communication protocols during incidents, ensuring clarity and timeliness.
- Cross-Functional Collaboration: Facilitate collaboration across Product, Infrastructure, SREs, GRC, ensuring cohesive incident response strategy.
- Continuous Process Improvement: Regularly refine incident response processes, incorporating the latest advancements for enhanced agility.
- Strategic Leadership for Scalability: Provide visionary leadership, ensuring operational scalability and efficiency in line with business needs.
- Team Development in a Security-Focused Culture: Cultivate a high-performance team, enhancing capabilities through training and development.
- Incident Documentation and Process Automation: Oversee incident documentation, refining response playbooks and guidelines with a focus on automation in security processes.
- Security Technology Management: Govern the development and maintenance of security tools, emphasizing integration in existing security pipelines.
- KPI-Driven Performance Assessment: Implement and monitor Key Performance Indicators to evaluate and improve incident response effectiveness.
- On-Demand Operational Readiness: Maintain readiness for critical incident management outside standard hours, integrating on-call responsibilities.
Requirements
- Senior Information Security Experience: Possess over 7 years in relevant Information Security roles, with at least 5 years in leading incident response and/or security operations teams.
- Data Analytics and Data Science: Knowledge of or utilized advanced data science and analytics methodologies to meticulously compile statistics on trends and anomalies, facilitating efficient data organization, retrieval, and analysis, enabling the identification of patterns and irregularities within vast datasets.
- DevSecOps and CI/CD Implementation: Experienced in establishing and enhancing security operations in product or cloud-native environments, with a focus on integrating security practices within CI/CD pipelines
- Security as Code Expertise: Proficient in implementing Security as Code methodologies, automating security processes in alignment with agile development practices
Incident Response Automations: Designs software programs to identify, contain, eradicate, and remediate security issues including triage and investigation present within cloudflare infrastructure. Leverages automation and CI/CD for continuous development, adhering to speed and accuracy.
- Proactive Goal Management: Skilled in independently defining and driving both immediate and strategic technical goals within a fast-paced security landscape.
- Team Mentorship and Development: Demonstrated capability in coaching and guiding junior team members, fostering a culture of continuous learning within a DevSecOps context.
- Technical Environment Mastery: In-depth understanding and hands-on experience with Linux/UNIX, MACOS, AWS, GCP, and Azure ecosystems, emphasizing security configurations and best practices.
- Advanced Security Operations Insight: Extensive background in security operations, particularly in incident detection, response, investigation, and mitigation, within a continuous integration and deployment environment.
- Security Tool Proficiency: Adept with advanced tools like SIEM, SOAR, and EDR, utilizing them for effective anomaly detection and incident response in a DevSecOps setting.
- Programming and Scripting Skills: Strong proficiency in programming languages such as Python, Go, Ruby, complemented by expertise in SQL and other database query languages.
- Effective Communication and Analytical Abilities: Excellent verbal and written communication skills, combined with robust problem-solving and independent judgment capabilities, vital for leading in a collaborative team environment.
- Incident Response Communication: Seasoned in articulating investigative findings and strategies to diverse audiences including technical staff, legal teams, and internal stakeholders.
- Leadership in Technical Team Growth: Track record of successfully managing, expanding, and steering technical teams, particularly in DevSecOps-oriented environments.
- Incident Response Function Building: Passion for creating and nurturing a dedicated Incident Response function from scratch, aligning it with modern security and development practices.
- Executive-Level Communication and Reporting: While "Incident Response Communication" to diverse audiences is listed, it does not explicitly mention the responsibility for regularly briefing C-suite executives or the Board of Directors on the company's security incident posture, major risks, and the strategic direction of the SIRT function. This is a critical duty for a Director who owns the global security response.
- Advanced Cloud Computing Deployment: Proficient in deploying diverse cloud solutions including IaaS, PaaS, SaaS, within a security-focused framework.
- Regulatory Framework Acumen: Familiarity with key regulations and standards such as SOX, FEDRAMP, NIST, ISO, GLBA, PCI-DSS, GDPR, CISA, applying them effectively in a DevSecOps environment.
Preferred Qualifications
Comprehensive knowledge of digital forensics investigations, encompassing chain of custody, evidence procedures, investigative interviewing techniques, information management, and legal processes.
- Experience with designing and managing incident response and security operations programs across large global enterprise technology companies
- Experience with software engineering, and designing custom security response tools.
- Experience with maturity and gap assessments
Compensation
Compensation may be adjusted depending on work location.
- For Bay Area based hires: Estimated annual salary of $225,000 - $310,000
- For New York City based hires: Estimated annual salary of $215,000 - $295,000
Equity
This role is eligible to participate in Cloudflare’s equity plan.
Benefits
Cloudflare offers a complete package of benefits and programs to support you and your family. Our benefits programs can help you pay health care expenses, support caregiving, build capital for the future and make life a little easier and fun! The below is a description of our benefits for employees in the United States, and benefits may vary for employees based outside the U.S.
Health & Welfare Benefits
- Medical/Rx Insurance
- Dental Insurance
- Vision Insurance
- Flexible Spending Accounts
- Commuter Spending Accounts
- Fertility & Family Forming Benefits
- On-demand mental health support and Employee Assistance Program
- Global Travel Medical Insurance
Financial Benefits
- Short and Long Term Disability Insurance
- Life & Accident Insurance
- 401(k) Retirement Savings Plan
- Employee Stock Participation Plan
Time Off
- Flexible paid time off covering vacation and sick leave
- Leave programs, including parental, pregnancy health, medical, and bereavement leave
What Makes Cloudflare Special?
We’re not just a highly ambitious, large-scale technology company. We’re a highly ambitious, large-scale technology company with a