Senior Consultant, DFIR, Reactive Services; Unit - Remote Santa Clara, California, United S

Our Mission

At Palo Alto Networks® everything starts and ends with our mission:

Being the cybersecurity partner of choice, protecting our digital way of life. Our vision is a world where each day is safer and more secure than the one before. We are a company built on the foundation of challenging and disrupting the way things are done, and we’re looking for innovators who are as committed to shaping the future of cybersecurity as we are.

This role is remote, but distance is no barrier to impact. Our hybrid teams collaborate across geographies to solve big problems, stay close to our customers, and grow together. You will be part of a culture that values trust, accountability, and shared success where your work truly matters.

This role is client-facing and requires the Senior Consultant to help lead and produce deliverables based on reactive services client engagements. The Senior Consultant will work directly with multiple customers and key stakeholders (Admins, C‑Suite, etc) to lead incident response incidents and guide clients through the engagement from start to finish.

• Perform reactive incident response functions including but not limited to: host‑based analysis functions through investigating Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X systems to identify Indicators of Compromise (IOCs).

• Examine firewall, web, database, and other log sources to identify evidence and artifacts of malicious and compromised activity.

• Investigate data breaches leveraging forensics tools including Encase, FTK, X‑Ways, SIFT, Splunk, and custom Unit 42 investigation tools to determine source of compromises and malicious activity that occurred in client environments.

• Lead incident response engagements to guide clients through forensic investigations, contain security incidents, and provide guidance on longer‑term remediation recommendations.

• Mentorship of Incident Response Consultants in incident response and forensics best practices.

• Ability to perform light travel requirements as needed to meet business demands (on average 20%).

• 4+ years of incident response or digital forensics experience with a passion for cyber security

• Proficient with host‑based forensics and data breach response

• Experienced with EnCase, FTK, X‑Ways, SIFT, Splunk, Volatility, Wire Shark, TCPDump, and open source forensic tools

• Identified ability to grow into a valuable contributor to the practice and, specifically:

  • have an external presence via public speaking, conferences, and/or publications;

  • have credibility, executive presence, and gravitas;

  • be able to have a meaningful and rapid delivery contribution;

  • have the potential and capacity to understand all aspects of the business and an excellent understanding of PANW products;

  • be collaborative and able to build relationships internally, externally, and across all PANW functions, including the sales team.

• Incident Response Consulting preferred

• Bachelor’s Degree in Information Security, Computer Science, Digital Forensics, Cyber Security or related field

Unit 42 Consulting is Palo Alto Network’s security advisory team. Our vision is to create a more secure digital world by providing the highest quality incident response, risk management, and digital forensic services to clients of all sizes. Our team is composed of recognized experts and incident responders with deep technical expertise and experience in investigations, data breach response, digital forensics, and information security.

With a highly successful track record of delivering mission‑critical cybersecurity solutions, we are experienced in working quickly to provide an effective incident response, attack readiness, and remediation plans with a focus on providing long‑term support to improve our clients’ security posture.

The compensation offered for this position will depend on qualifications, experience, and work location. For candidates who receive an offer at the posted level, the starting base salary (for non‑sales roles) or base salary + commission target (for sales/commissioned roles) is expected to be between $128,000 - $176,000/YR. The offered compensation may also include…