Principal Security Researcher

Job d:

Location:

United States, Washington, Redmond Salary: USD $142,800 - $274,800 per year

Employment type:

Full-Time Work site: 3 days / week in-office

Role type:
Individual Contributor Travel:
Less than 25%
Profession:
Security Engineering Discipline:
Security Research Company:
Microsoft Overview Microsoft  Security Research brings together deep security expertise, threat intelligence, and Microsoft’s unique security telemetry to understand the evolving threat landscape and improve protection for customers. We are looking for a Principal Security Researcher to lead research across the Microsoft Defender ecosystem and partner with teams across Microsoft Security to transform these signals into high-confidence, actionable security intelligence.

Working closely with threat intelligence experts, data and applied scientists, engineers, and product teams, you will combine threat knowledge with large-scale security data to develop customer-specific finished intelligence and broader insights into emerging threats, attacker behavior, exposure, and protection trends.

The role goes beyond identifying what the data shows: you will provide the deep security research judgment needed to determine what matters, why it matters, and what SOC practitioners and security leaders can do about it. You will work directly with customer-facing teams and security practitioners to rapidly test new intelligence concepts, incorporate real-world feedback, and iterate on what delivers the greatest value.

You will also leverage AI to accelerate research and analysis, rapidly prototype new intelligence capabilities, and help turn successful approaches into scalable solutions. Through this work, you will establish analytical methodologies and quality standards and help translate novel research into durable capabilities across customer engagements, Microsoft security products and services, and emerging AI-powered security experiences.

Microsoft’s mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. As employees we come together with a growth mindset, innovate to empower others, and collaborate to realize our shared goals. Each day we build on our values of respect, integrity, and accountability to create a culture of inclusion where everyone can thrive at work and beyond.

Responsibilities Lead research that transforms threat intelligence and large-scale security telemetry into actionable security intelligence, identifying emerging threats and attacker behavior, assessing customer impact and protection effectiveness, and translating complex evidence into defensible conclusions and prioritized actions for security practitioners and leaders. Establish and evolve analytical methodologies, research standards, and quality criteria that enable rigorous, repeatable, and scalable analysis and set a high bar for customer-specific and broader finished intelligence.

Work across Microsoft Defender and partner teams across Microsoft, bringing together security research, threat intelligence, data and applied science, engineering, and product expertise to turn novel research and analytical approaches into durable security capabilities. Rapidly prototype, validate, and iterate on new intelligence capabilities, incorporating feedback from customers and security practitioners while leveraging AI to accelerate research, analysis, experimentation, and the path from concept to scalable solution.

Provide Principal-level technical and industry leadership by shaping research direction, mentoring researchers, communicating complex findings to technical and executive audiences, and influencing security investments and product direction through research insights.

Qualifications

Required Qualifications:

Doctorate in Statistics, Mathematics, Computer Science, Computer Security, or related field AND 3+ years experience in software development lifecycle, large-scale computing, threat analysis or modeling, cybersecurity, vulnerability research, and/or anomaly detection OR Master's Degree in Statistics, Mathematics, Computer Science, Computer Security, or related field AND 4+ years experience in software development lifecycle, large-scale computing, threat analysis or modeling, cybersecurity, vulnerability research, and/or anomaly detection OR Bachelor's Degree in Statistics, Mathematics, Computer Science, Computer Security, or related field AND 6+ years experience in software development lifecycle, large-scale computing, threat analysis or modeling,…