Position: Senior Security Engineer (Detection Engineer) New

REA; Melbourne; Hybrid; AUD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hybrid and flexible working

Birthday leave

Parental leave

Volunteering leave

Hackdays

Job summary

REA Group is seeking a Senior Security Engineer to lead detection and response initiatives in Melbourne or Sydney, with remote options across Australia. You will modernise our detection capability by building and tuning data flows, telemetry integrations and detection workflows, using AI-assisted tooling to improve coverage and alert quality.

In collaboration with a diverse Security and Engineering team, you’ll implement automation, runbooks and containment playbooks, while aligning with

Qualifications

• Hands-on experience configuring data flows including log forwarding and ingestion.
• Experience with cloud environments (AWS, GCP, Azure).
• Ability to define threats and validate high-fidelity detections.
• Strong log analysis and scripting for automation.
• Knowledge of MITRE ATT&CK and security telemetry.

Responsibilities

• Configure data flows and telemetry integrations for the detection platform.
• Define threats to detect and tune high-fidelity detections.
• Develop automated detection testing and validation.
• Analyse security events and investigate malicious activity.
• Translate threat intelligence into improved coverage.
• Coordinate containment and incident response with teams.
• Develop playbooks and automation workflows.
• Collaborate with product, platform and engineering teams for logging and monitoring.
• Share knowledge and contribute to documentation.

Skills

Log forwarding

Data transformation

Cloud platforms

Threat detection engineering

Scripting

Security tooling

MITRE ATT&CK

DevOps / CI/CD

Observability pipelines

Tools

EDR

SIEM

CNAPP

SOAR

Job description

Senior Security Engineer (Detection Engineer)

• We're taking an engineering-led approach to detection and response, building internal capability and technical depth alongside AI-assisted tooling. You’ll work as an individual contributor, driving workstreams from problem definition through delivery, breaking complex problems into actionable work, and executing independently within agreed architecture and practices
• Permanent role based in Melbourne or Sydney as well as open to remote in other Australian locations

We're REA

With bold and ambitious goals, REA Group is changing the way the world experiences property. No matter where you're at on your property journey, we're here to help with every step – whether that's finding or financing your next home.

Our people are the key to our success. At the heart of everything we do, is a thriving culture centred around high performance and care. We are purpose driven and collaborative, which drives innovation and our ability to make a real impact. As such, we’re proud to have been named one of Australia’s Best Workplaces four times since 2021 — including third place in 2025 — plus Best Workplace for Women in 2023 and Best Workplace in Technology in 2024 and 2025. These listings are testament to every person who helps make REA a great place to work.

Where the team fits in

The Detection & Response team helps REA identify, investigate and respond to cyber threats across our environment. The team monitors security signals, validates alerts, investigates suspicious activity and leads or supports coordinated incident response including technical investigation and containment in partnership with engineering teams. With an increasing focus on detection and response engineering, the team continually strengthens REA’s ability to spot threats earlier, reduce the impact of incidents and learn from events to improve our security posture.

What the role is all about

As a Senior Security Engineer in Detection & Response, you’ll help modernise REA’s detection capability by operating and improving the data flows, telemetry integrations and detection workflows that power the detection platform. You’ll use AI-assisted tooling to develop, review and validate high-fidelity detections and response automations, applying sound security judgement and detection-as-code practices to improve coverage and alert quality. You’ll evaluate threat intelligence in the context of REA’s environment to focus detection coverage on relevant adversaries, investigate suspicious activity, and independently coordinate technical containment and response. You’ll work with and be supported by a diverse, dynamic, and well-rounded Detection & Response team. Working with wider Security and Engineering teams, you’ll improve detection quality and resilience over time.

Day to day of the job

• Configure and operate the data flows that support our detection platform, including log forwarding, transformation and cost optimisation, working with Platform and Cloud teams where changes to existing integrations are needed.
• Define the threats and behaviours to detect, then review, tune and validate the high-fidelity detections and correlation logic that identify malicious activity across our environment, delivering measurable improvements in detection coverage and alert quality.
• Develop and maintain automated detection testing and validation processes to identify configuration drift, regressions and coverage gaps.
• Analyse security events and logs to identify malicious activity, patterns and emerging attack techniques during investigations and proactive threat hunting.
• Assess relevant threat intelligence and emerging attack techniques in the context of REA’s environment, translating the findings into improved detection coverage and signal quality.
• Investigate security alerts and incidents, independently determine whether containment is required, coordinate technical response activities, and communicate findings, actions and risks to the wider incident response team and business stakeholders as needed.
• Develop response playbooks and automation workflows to support rapid and effective incident containment and response.
• Partner with product, platform and engineering teams to ensure new systems and changes have appropriate logging, monitoring, and detection coverage.
• Share knowledge with other Security and engineering teams, contributing to documentation, operational practices and continuous improvement.

Who we’re looking for

• Hands-on experience configuring and operating data flows, including log forwarding, data transformation, API integrations, cost-optimised ingestion and observability pipeline tools, with the ability to work with Platform and Cloud teams when existing integrations need changes.
• Practical experience working in cloud environments (AWS, GCP or Azure), with an understanding of cloud and application architectures, logging, monitoring, native security controls and common failure modes, and how to translate these into detection and response requirements.
• Practical experience defining the threats and behaviours to detect, and reviewing, tuning and validating high-fidelity detections through established detection-engineering practices and repository workflows.
• Strong log analysis skills, with the ability to parse, correlate and investigate security events across diverse log sources, and a working knowledge of scripting to understand and work effectively with security automation and SOAR workflows.
• Experience with security observability tooling including EDR, SIEM, CNAPP, SOAR, and identity platforms, understanding their telemetry and how to leverage it for high-fidelity detections
• Solid understanding of attacker techniques and frameworks (e.g. MITRE ATT&CK) and how to translate threat intelligence into effective detections and coverage assessments
• Familiarity with modern DevOps practices including CI/CD pipelines and automated deployment for security tooling
• Ability to build automation workflows for security operations and document operational procedures through playbooks, runbooks and detection test cases

The REA experience

The physical, mental, emotional and financial health of our people is something we’ll never stop caring about. This is a place to learn and grow.

• A hybrid and flexible approach to working
• Flexible leave options including, birthday leave and purchase additional leave
• Flexible parental leave offering for primary and secondary carers
• Our Because We Care program offers employees volunteering leave, community grants, matched payroll giving and our Community Café donates 100% of revenue to charity
• Hackdays so you can bring your big ideas to life

Our commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

We are committed to providing a working environment that embraces and values diversity, equity and inclusion. We believe teams with diverse ideas and experiences are more creative, more effective and fuel disruptive thinking. If you've got the skills, dedication and enthusiasm to learn but don't necessarily meet every single point on the job description, please still get in touch.

Like a lot of companies, we have perps out there who like to ‘phish’ and have had a few recent instances of people pretending to be from REA and making offers of employment, on the condition that they transfer money for security checks.

Find out more about our tech teams who build products that millions of people use every day.

Our corporate headquarters in Melbourne is a bright open space, open to possibilities.