Cyber Security Engineer

Firstcentral; Manchester; Hybrid; GBP 60,000 - 90,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hybrid working

Home-based with optional office days

Job summary

1st Central is seeking a Cyber Security Engineer to join the Cyber and Information Security team. The role focuses on implementing, maintaining and improving security controls, telemetry and automation across the organisation.

It is predominantly home-based with one day a week in the office in Salford Quays, Haywards Heath or Guernsey, with flexibility to spend more time in the office. The ideal candidate will have hands-on experience across Microsoft security technologies, security engineering

Qualifications

• Cyber security engineering experience in security platform engineering or related field.
• Hands-on with Microsoft security technologies (Defender XDR, Purview, Sentinel, Defender for Cloud, Entra).
• Relevant technical security qualification or equivalent practical experience.
• Strong troubleshooting and analytical skills.
• Excellent communication and stakeholder management.
• Good organisational skills and ability to prioritise across multiple stakeholders.

Responsibilities

• Engineer, configure and maintain cyber security controls across the Microsoft security estate.
• Develop and maintain security telemetry, data connectors and monitoring.
• Build and maintain security automation and SOAR playbooks and automated containment actions.
• Implement and maintain technical security policies, baselines and guardrails.
• Translate threat intelligence into effective technical controls and monitoring capabilities.
• Support security controls for end users, Azure workloads, cloud services and identities.
• Integrate security into DevOps and value-stream delivery with relevant tooling and telemetry.
• Contribute to AI defence capabilities and runtime security guardrails.
• Monitor health, coverage, and effectiveness of cyber security tooling and identify improvements.
• Provide technical support to cyber incident investigations and threat hunting.
• Remediate weaknesses with technology teams and verify corrective controls.
• Undertake cyber control reviews of third-party platforms and integrations.
• Maintain technical documentation and evidence relating to security platforms and controls.
• Assess proposed changes to tooling and identify risks and dependencies.
• Contribute to cyber metrics and reporting including coverage and automation effectiveness.
• Ensure compliance with regulatory requirements.

Skills

Cyber Security Engineering

Microsoft Security Technologies

Technical Security Expertise

Troubleshooting & Analysis

Communication & Stakeholder Management

Organisation & Prioritisation

Tools

Microsoft Defender XDR

Microsoft Sentinel

Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Entra

Purview

Job description

At 1st Central, everything starts with our people.

As one of the UK's leading motor and home insurers, we use smart technology, data and great service to make insurance fast, fair and simple for over 1.4 million customers. We're proud to create an environment where people feel supported, trusted and able to grow - whether that's developing new skills, taking on fresh challenges or making a real impact every day. If you're looking for a role where you can make a difference, we'd love to hear from you.

We're looking for a Cyber Security Engineer to join our Cyber and Information Security team, this technically focused role is responsible for implementing, maintaining and improving specialist cyber security controls, tooling, telemetry and automation across the organisation.

Working closely with teams across Technology & Data you'll ensure that security controls are designed in line with best practice and are effective, scalable and aligned to business and regulatory requirements.

We're big on flexible hybrid working . This role is predominantly home-based, with just one day a week in the office in either Salford Quays (Manchester), Haywards Heath (West Sussex) or Guernsey . Of course, if you'd like to spend more time working alongside the team, you're always welcome to come into the office more frequently.

Core skills we're looking for to succeed in the role:

• Cyber Security Engineering: Practical experience in cyber security engineering, security platform engineering, or a closely related technical security role.
• Microsoft Security Technologies: Hands-on experience with Microsoft security technologies, including Defender XDR, Purview, Sentinel, Defender for Cloud, and Entra security capabilities.
• Technical Security Expertise: A relevant technical security qualification or equivalent practical experience, such as AZ-500, SC-200, SC-300, SC-100, CISSP, or similar.
• Troubleshooting & Analysis: Strong technical troubleshooting and analytical skills, with the ability to investigate and resolve security-related issues.
• Communication & Stakeholder Management: Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills, with the ability to explain technical security matters clearly to different audiences.
• Organisation & Prioritisation: Good organisational skills, with the ability to manage and prioritise engineering activity across multiple stakeholders.

What's involved:

• You'll engineer, configure and maintain cyber security controls across the Microsoft security estate, including Microsoft Defender XDR, Microsoft Sentinel, Microsoft Defender for Cloud, Entra, Microsoft Purview and associated integrations.
• You'll develop and maintain security telemetry, data connectors, alerting integrations, workbooks and technical monitoring coverage across cloud, identity, endpoint, email, applications and agentic services.
• You'll build, test and maintain security automation, orchestration and response workflows, including SOAR playbooks and approved automated containment actions.
• You'll implement and maintain technical security policies, baselines and guardrails defined by Information Security, Cyber and Architecture.
• You'll work with Cyber and the SOC to translate threat intelligence, incident learning and detection requirements into effective technical controls and monitoring capabilities.
• You'll support the engineering and continuous improvement of security controls for end users, Azure workloads, cloud services, identities, workloads and non-human or agent identities.
• You'll integrate security controls into DevOps and value-stream delivery practices, including relevant security tooling, telemetry and automated control checks.
• You'll contribute to the implementation of runtime controls, monitoring, containment and security guardrails for AI agents, autonomous workflows and connected tools.
• You'll contribute to the implementation and maintenance of AI defence capabilities.
• You'll monitor the health, coverage, effectiveness and lifecycle of cyber security tooling, identifying control gaps, technical debt and opportunities for rationalisation or automation.
• You'll provide technical support to cyber incident investigations, threat hunting, control validation and recovery activities when required.
• You'll remediate and/or work with Technology teams and value streams to support the remediation of security weaknesses and confirm that corrective controls have been implemented effectively.
• You'll undertake Cyber control reviews of 3rd party platforms and integrations against best practice.
• You'll maintain technical documentation, configuration standards, operating procedures and evidence relating to security platforms and controls.
• You'll assess proposed technical changes to security tooling and controls, identifying risks, dependencies and implementation requirements.
• You'll contribute to cyber metrics and reporting, including control coverage, platform health, automation effectiveness and remediation progress.
• You'll ensure complian