Sr Software Engineer; Gen Firewall - Dataplane

Sr Staff Software Engineer (Next Gen Firewall – Dataplane)

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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.

Who We Are:

We take our mission of protecting the digital way of life seriously. We are relentless in protecting our customers and we believe that the unique ideas of every member of our team contributes to our collective success. Our values were crowdsourced by employees and are brought to life through each of us everyday — from disruptive innovation and collaboration to execution.

From showing up for each other with integrity to creating an environment where we all feel included.

As a member of our team, you will be shaping the future of cybersecurity. We work fast, value ongoing learning, and respect each employee as a unique individual. Knowing we all have different needs, our development and personal wellbeing programs are designed to give you choice in how you are supported. This includes our FLEX Benefits wellbeing spending account with over 1,000 eligible items, our mental and financial health resources, and personalized learning opportunities.

We believe in the power of collaboration and value in‑person interactions. This is why our employees generally work full time from our office with flexibility offered where needed. This setup fosters casual conversations, problem‑solving, and trusted relationships. Our goal is to create an environment where we all win with precision.

We are looking for motivated, smart, hardworking and passionate individuals to join the Next‑gen Firewall dataplane team as a Software Engineer. You will be part of a world‑class software engineering team that works on various cutting‑edge technologies for the firewall. As a member of a data‑plane networking software group, you will be responsible for designing and developing the next‑generation firewall. You will take ownership of large software components, work with product management on real‑life customer requirements, apply your knowledge to functional design, utilize your programming skills for efficient and robust implementation, and interact with quality assurance and field support teams throughout the entire software development cycle.

• Responsible for development of the critical dataplane components for the state‑of‑the‑art Next Generation Firewalls deployed at Enterprise, Data Center, Cloud, and Service Provider environments.
• Lead L2‑L4 network security feature development.
• Lead next‑generation security product development.
• Support critical customer escalations and provide root cause analysis in a timely manner.
• Work with multi‑functional team members on user requirements, including Product Management, QA, Support, etc.
• Effective decision maker, take ownership and independently drive, lead tasks and assignments.

• Experience in common network protocols such as TCP/IP, IPv4, IPv6, multicast.
• Experience in dataplane technologies like DPDK‑based packet processing.
• Experience in typical network device features like NAT, ALG, DoS Protection.
• Experience in computer architecture, cybersecurity, and distributed systems.
• Good to have experience in using Broadcom chips for switching, QoS, and interface management.
• In‑depth understanding of common software vulnerabilities and mitigations.
• In‑depth understanding of Linux systems.
• C, Python, Shell script programming skills.
• Experience in networking domains.
• Strong communication skills to work effectively with multi‑functional groups.
• BS/MS degree in Computer Science or equivalent, or equivalent military experience required.
• 4+ years of related programming experience.

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