Principal Security Engineer

About Upstart

Upstart is the leading AI lending marketplace partnering with banks and credit unions to expand access to affordable credit. By leveraging Upstart's AI marketplace, Upstart-powered banks and credit unions can have higher approval rates and lower loss rates across races, ages, and genders, while simultaneously delivering the exceptional digital-first lending experience their customers demand. More than 80% of borrowers are approved instantly, with zero documentation to upload.

Upstart is a digital-first company, which means that most Upstarters live and work anywhere in the United States. However, we also have offices in San Mateo, California;
Columbus, Ohio; and Austin, Texas.

Most Upstarters join us because they connect with our mission of enabling access to effortless credit based on true risk. If you are energized by the impact you can make at Upstart, we’d love to hear from you!

Upstart’s Security team is dedicated to advancing security practices that enhance the safety of our products, customers, and partners. We believe that security should empower innovation, move at the speed of business, and be designed for safety from the ground up. Our mission is to protect Upstart’s products & enterprise, and manage threats to Upstart. We achieve this through automation, strong collaboration with partner teams, and a commitment to maintain a positive experience for Upstarters.

As a Principal Security Engineer, you will play a pivotal role in shaping Upstart’s security strategy for protecting our business. You will architect, design, and influence our security measures across many security controls and drive our roadmap forward. You will develop and implement security patterns to protect Upstart while enabling the business to move quickly. This role requires a well-rounded security practitioner who has deep experience in access management and data security, and who can partner across the organization with Business, Risk, and Engineering leaders to achieve large cross‑functional goals.

• Lead complex, high‑impact security initiatives with cross‑team dependencies across our products, services, infrastructure, and enterprise
• Collaborate with key stakeholders to develop and implement security patterns that protect our data and systems
• Provide mentorship, foster a strong security culture and promote security excellence
• Build systems and automated processes to ensure that the right data is in the right place, with only the right people having access to it
• Develop innovative processes that enhances both security and the user experience for key business processes

Minimum requirements:

• Deep expertise across enterprise and operational security domains (e.g. Data Security, Endpoint Security, Detection Engineering, Identity & Access Management)
• Ability to software engineer solutions to complex problems with the assistance of GenAI
• Demonstrable track record as an influential security leader, driving security solutions across multiple stakeholder groups
• Experience with advanced threat modeling techniques and risk assessment
• Strong communication skills, capable of engaging senior leadership through clear, concise, and effective messaging (both written and verbal).
• Ability to promote innovative security solutions while independently navigating ambiguity to drive change.
• Significant experience in security leadership, open to strong individual contributors and people managers

Preferred qualifications:

• Experience as the primary stakeholder for Data Security and Data Loss Prevention
• Contributions to the security industry (e.g. industry presentations, white papers, OSS projects, patents)
• Familiarity with compliance frameworks, including SOC1, SOC2, and SOX

This role is available in the following locations:
Remote, San Mateo, Columbus, Austin

This team operates across all U.S. time zones.

This team has regular on‑site collaboration sessions. These occur 3 days per quarter at an Upstart office. If you need to travel to make these meetups, Upstart will cover all travel related expenses.

• Competitive Compensation…