Director, Security Operations & Detection Engineering

Aurora; Seattle (WA); Hybrid; USD 247,000 - 358,000; Full time

Job summary

Aurora is seeking a Director of Security Operations & Detection Engineering to lead the Detection & Response (D&R) and Security Operations Center (SOC) within the Technical Assurance division. You will set strategy, build a multi-team organization, and serve as the executive contact for cyber defense and audits.

You will own end-to-end incident response posture,-drive 24x7 coverage, and direct tooling across SIEM/EDR/NDR/SOAR, cloud-native and on-vehicle environments, with a focus on leadership

Qualifications

• 15+ years in cybersecurity with leadership experience.
• Hands-on detection engineering, threat hunting or incident response.
• Strong knowledge of SIEM/EDR/NDR/SOAR and cloud-native environments.

Responsibilities

• Lead and unify D&R and SOC teams across 24x7 operations.
• Define multi-year strategy and roadmap for detection engineering and incident response.
• Oversee cloud/vehicle security and vulnerability management programs.

Skills

Leadership

Incident response

Threat hunting

Detection engineering

Cloud security

MITRE/ NIST

Vulnerability management

Metrics & reporting

DevSecOps

Python/C++

Tools

Python

C++

AWS

Kubernetes

Snowflake

SQL

Terraform

eBPF

Job description

Who We Are

Aurora’s mission is to deliver the benefits of self-driving technology safely, quickly, and broadly.

The Aurora Driver will create a new era in mobility and logistics, one that will bring a safer, more efficient, and more accessible future to everyone.

At Aurora, you will tackle massively complex problems alongside other passionate, intelligent individuals, growing as an expert while expanding your knowledge. For the latest news from Aurora, visit aurora.tech or follow us on LinkedIn.

What We Are Looking For

We are searching for a Director of Security Operations & Detection Engineering to lead and unify Aurora’s Detection & Response (D&R) and Security Operations Center (SOC) functions under our Technical Assurance division. This role owns the strategy, roadmap, and operating rigor for how Aurora detects, triages, investigates, and responds to threats across Onboard (vehicle), Cloud, and Enterprise environments - spanning both the engineering that builds our detection capability and the 24x7 operations that run it. This is a strategic people-leadership role. You will set direction, build and scale a multi-team organization, and represent cyber defense to executive stakeholders.

In this role you will

• Own end-to-end leadership of the D&R and SOC teams, including engineers and analysts across detection engineering, incident response, and 24x7 monitoring/triage.
• Own 24x7 staffing model, on-call rotations, and resource allocation across time zones to ensure continuous coverage; participate in leadership escalation on-call as needed.
• Define and drive the multi-year strategy and roadmap for detection engineering, threat hunting, incident response, and security operations.
• Stay close enough to the technology (SIEM, EDR, NDR, SOAR, cloud-native and vehicle/embedded environments) to make architecture and prioritization calls, review technical strategy with your leads, and step in on the highest-stakes technical problems or incidents.
• Own end-to-end incident response posture - from detection through containment, eradication, recovery, and post-incident reviews. Serve as the executive point of contact for cybersecurity incidents and audits.
• Oversee cloud vulnerability management: ensure findings are triaged by severity/exploitability, owners are assigned, and remediation or compensating controls are tracked to closure against SLAs.
• Oversee design, development, and implementation of detections, tooling and Cross Functional projects that touch Cloud, Enterprise, and On-Vehicle D&R/SOC.
• Own and report on KPIs, telemetry coverage, alert fidelity, and SOC efficiency and maturity to executive leadership.

Required Qualifications

• 15+ years of progressive cybersecurity experience, including 6+ years leading, managing, and scaling detection engineering and security operations teams.
• Current hands-on experience with detection engineering, threat hunting, or incident response sufficient to credibly guide technical strategy and support your team.
• Strong working knowledge of SIEM, EDR, NDR/SOAR, and modern detection and response tooling. Strong understanding of cloud-native environments (AWS, Kubernetes) and enterprise/endpoint security (Linux, macOS, Windows).
• Deep knowledge of the MITRE ATT&CK framework, NIST CSF, and modern adversarial techniques.
• End-to-end incident management experience, driving cross-departmental collaboration through high-severity incidents.
• Experience with vulnerability management, including triage/prioritization of findings and driving remediation across engineering teams.
• Demonstrated experience building a metrics/reporting program from scratch (defining metrics, implementing measurement, and coaching a team to deliver insight rather than raw data) for a technical function.
• Working proficiency in Python and/or C++.
• Experience building and maintaining security data lakes and big data tooling (e.g., AWS Athena, Snowflake, SQL/data warehousing).
• Experience designing and implementing Zero Trust Architecture.
• Experience with low-level data collection frameworks (e.g., auditd, sysmon, eBPF).
• Familiarity with systems architecture, distributed systems, and microservices, and with performance monitoring/capacity planning for network operations.
• Experience with DevSecOps, CI/CD, and Infrastructure-as-Code (e.g., Git, Terraform).

Desirable Qualifications

• Experience with vehicle/embedded or OT security, or strong willingness to ramp up quickly in this area.

For roles based in Mountain View, CA and Seattle, WA: The salary range for this position is $247,000 - $358,000 per year.

For roles based in Pittsburgh, PA: The salary range for this position is $223,000 - $323,000 per year.

Aurora’s pay ranges are determined by role, level, and location. Within the range, the successful candidate’s starting base pay will be determined based on factors including job-related skills, experience, qualifications, relevant education or training, and market conditions. These ranges may be modified in the future. The successful candidate will also be eligible for an annual bonus, equity compensation, and benefits.

Working at Aurora

At Aurora, we bring together extraordinarily talented and experienced people united by the strength of our values. We operate with integrity, set outrageous goals, and build a culture where we win together — all without any jerks.

We believe in-person work increases collaboration, empathy and our ability to lead effectively. As a result, we operate in a hybrid work environment where Aurorans are in office at least 3 days per week.

Our Careers page provides insight into what it is like to work at Aurora, and you can find all the latest updates in our Newsroom.

Our commitment to safety

At the core of everything we do is our commitment to safety. Building best-in-class self-driving technology will take time, and we believe that each employee at Aurora has a role in contributing to safety, every step of the way. Aurora expects commitment to our safety policies from every employee, and seeks candidates who take an active responsibility, can contribute to building an atmosphere of trust, and invest in the organization’s long-term success by prioritizing working safely, no matter what.

Our commitment to inclusion

Aurora considers candidates without regard to their race, color, religion, national origin, age, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, marital status, pregnancy status, parent or caregiver status, ancestry, political affiliation, veteran and/or military status, physical or mental disability, or any other status protected by federal or state law. Aurora considers qualified applicants with criminal histories, consistent with applicable federal, state, and local law. We are also committed to providing reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities and disabled veterans in our job application procedures. If you need assistance or an accommodation due to a disability, you may contact us at [e-mail].

For California applicants, information collected and processed as part of your application and any job applications you choose to submit is subject to Aurora’s California Employment Privacy Policy.