Principal Security Research Engineer - Threat Defense

Principal Security Research Engineer

Come work at a place where innovation and teamwork come together to support the most exciting missions in the world!

Principal Security Researcher – Threat Defense

Location: Pune, India (Hybrid) / Remote

Department: Research

The Mission

We are seeking a Security Researcher who is a builder, not just an analyst. Bridging the gap between advanced threat research and active defense, you will lead a R&D mandate to design engines that pinpoint real customer risk. You bring a rare blend of deep security expertise (Zero-days, CVEs, Exploits) and software engineering rigor to drive operational excellence at scale.

You will serve as a key player in our Research Department, moving beyond standard vulnerability analysis to build next-generation detection capabilities. Your work will directly influence our threat defense engine.

What You’ll Be Doing:

• Conduct deep-dive research into emerging attack vectors to analyze vulnerability data and identify potential attack paths.
• Assess vulnerability risks to develop tailored, actionable mitigation strategies and plans that address security gaps in critical systems.
• Rapidly architect and build prototypes, PoCs, and detection tools. You won’t just theorize; you will write code (Python/Go/C) to test security hypotheses and demonstrate feasibility.
• Design and validate algorithms based on network and application telemetry to detect complex exploit primitives (RCE, SQLi, Memory Corruption) at the execution boundary.
• Partner with R&D and Product teams to translate complex research findings into production-grade security features, ensuring our engine evolves faster than the threat landscape.
• Articulate security visions and research findings to the broader community through blogs, webinars, and industry conferences, reinforcing Qualys as a thought leader in the space.

The DNA We Need

We are looking for a technologist with a hacker mindset—someone who loves to explore how things work under the hood and prefers architecting solutions over maintaining legacy views.

• 5+ years of experience in security research or low-level software engineering, with a focus on advanced threat detection and deep attack analysis.
• Proven ability to develop robust PoCs and tools. You are comfortable reading and writing code in modern frameworks (Python, Go, or similar).
• Strong understanding of the Linux ecosystem, OS internals, and cloud-native environments.
• A track record of taking a vulnerability or theoretical attack method and converting it into a concrete detection rule or defensive tool.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills in English. You can effectively explain complex kernel-level concepts to stakeholders and present findings.

Preferred Background:

• Experience applying advanced AI/ML and LLMs to solve complex security challenges, automating expert tradecraft such as code analysis or adversarial simulation, to transform manual research workflows into autonomous, scalable defense engines.
• Experience with eBPF, syscall tracing, or memory management.
• Experience in architecting secure systems and deploying detection mechanisms to mitigate risk.
• Experience building or securing developer-focused tools and pipelines.
• Demonstrated ability to work independently in a fast-paced, unstructured environment where you wear multiple hats.

Why Join?

This is a role for a creator. You will have the mandate to innovate, the freedom to research, and the resources to build engines that define the state of the art in cyber defense.

Experience Level

Senior Level