Director, Network Security (AI Infrastructure)

Capital Executive Search; Sydney; On-site; AUD 260,000 - 360,000; Full time

Job summary

Capital Executive Search is seeking a Director of Network Security to define strategy, build a high-performing team, and protect large-scale production networks powering AI and HPC platforms. You will own the security roadmap across data centre fabrics, WAN, backbone, and peering, inspiring a culture of security-by-design.

You will engineer security architecture, implement zero-trust, manage incidents and automate policy-as-code across CI/CD pipelines, while collaborating with compliance and

Qualifications

• Extensive experience leading network security across large-scale data centre, cloud, carrier or hyperscale environments.
• Deep expertise in firewalls, segmentation, zero-trust, multi-tenant isolation and DDoS protection.
• Strong understanding of BGP, OSPF/IS-IS, VXLAN, EVPN and MPLS, including routing security (RPKI).
• Experience delivering policy-as-code, security automation and tooling using Python or Go.
• Experience applying AI and automation to security operations, threat detection or incident investigation.
• Proven experience building and leading security teams, managing incidents, risk and audits.
• Familiarity with security frameworks such as NIST, ISO 27001, SOC 2 and IEC 62443.
• Experience securing AI infrastructure, HPC or industrial OT networks is highly regarded.
• Strong communication skills for explaining risks to engineers and executives.

Responsibilities

• Own network security strategy and roadmap across data centre fabrics and WAN.
• Lead security architecture including segmentation, zero-trust and DDoS protection.
• Oversee security operations, threat detection, incident response and vulnerability management.
• Establish security standards and ensure designs meet security requirements.
• Drive policy, segmentation and compliance into CI/CD pipelines and automated enforcement.
• Lead development of security automation and tooling, including applying AI to threat detection and triage.
• Partner with corporate security, compliance and customer teams on audits and risk management.
• Build, lead and develop a team of network security engineers and architects.

Skills

Network security

Security architecture

Zero-trust

DDoS protection

Firewall policy

Threat detection

Incident response

Policy-as-code

Python

Go

AI in security

Security audits

NIST

ISO 27001

IEC 62443

Job description

I’m currently working with a leading AI infrastructure business that is scaling its global network engineering function. They are looking for a Director of Network Security to define security strategy, build a team and protect large-scale production networks supporting AI and high-performance computing. This is an opportunity to shape network security from the ground up across a rapidly growing AI cloud platform, spanning data centre GPU fabrics, WAN, backbone, peering and facilities networks.

The Role

• Own network security strategy and roadmap across data centre fabrics, WAN, backbone, internet and peering infrastructure
• Lead network security architecture, including segmentation, tenant isolation, firewall policy, zero-trust access and DDoS protection
• Oversee security operations, threat detection, incident response and vulnerability management across production networks
• Establish security standards and ensure network designs and infrastructure changes meet security requirements
• Drive security-as-code, embedding policy, segmentation and compliance into software, CI/CD pipelines and automated enforcement
• Lead the development of security automation and tooling, including applying AI to threat detection, triage and investigation
• Partner with corporate security, compliance and customer teams on audits, risk management and security requirements
• Build, lead and develop a team of network security engineers and architects

Desired Qualifications

• Extensive experience leading network security across large-scale data centre, cloud, carrier or hyperscale production environments (critical)
• Deep expertise in firewalls, network segmentation, zero-trust access, multi-tenant isolation and DDoS protection
• Strong understanding of BGP, OSPF or IS-IS, VXLAN, EVPN and MPLS, including routing security such as RPKI
• Strong software engineering experience delivering policy-as-code, security automation and tooling using languages such as Python or Go
• Experience applying AI and automation to security operations, threat detection or incident investigation
• Proven experience building and leading security teams, managing incidents, risk and audits
• Familiarity with security frameworks such as NIST, ISO 27001, SOC 2 and IEC 62443
• Experience securing AI infrastructure, high-performance computing or industrial OT networks would be highly regarded
• Strong communication skills, with the ability to articulate technical risks and trade-offs to engineers and executive stakeholders