Offensive Security Engineer

Palantir; Washington (District of Columbia); On-site; USD 145,000 - 200,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Relocation assistance

2 weeks paid time off year-end

10 holidays per year

401k plan

Job summary

Palantir Technologies in Washington, DC seeks an Offensive Security Engineer to assess internal apps, infrastructure, and cloud environments, translating findings into prioritized remediation.

You will design offensive tooling, coordinate third‑party engagements, and work with engineers to reproduce and verify fixes across Palantir’s stack.

Qualifications

• 4+ years of professional experience in offensive security, penetration testing, red teaming, or related field.
• Experience testing web apps and networks, with ability to move between source code and runtime testing.
• Hands-on tooling experience and comfort writing code to automate testing.
• Strong understanding of cloud, container, and orchestration security principles.

Responsibilities

• Conduct hybrid web app penetration tests combining source review with runtime testing.
• Perform external network penetration tests against internet-facing infrastructure.
• Assess internal network and AD security, identifying privilege escalation and misconfigurations.
• Evaluate cloud and container security, including identity and workload configurations.
• Coordinate third-party pentest engagements end-to-end and translate findings into remediation.
• Collaborate with engineering to reproduce, prioritize, and verify fixes.

Skills

Web application pentesting

External network pentesting

Internal network & AD security

Cloud & container security

CI/CD & IaC awareness

Scripting (Python/Go)

Security tooling (Burp Suite, Nuclei)

Code for testing tooling

Cloud platforms (AWS/Azure/GCP)

Tools

Burp Suite

BloodHound/SharpHound

Certipy

Impacket

Responder

Pacu/ScoutSuite

Nuclei

Job description

A World-Changing Company

Palantir builds the world’s leading software for data-driven decisions and operations. By bringing the right data to the people who need it, our platforms empower our partners to develop lifesaving drugs, forecast supply chain disruptions, locate missing children, and more.

The Role

Palantir's Offensive Security team probes our own products, infrastructure, and cloud environment the way a real attacker would. As an Offensive Security Engineer, you will test internal applications and infrastructure, chain findings into realistic attack paths, and work directly with the engineers responsible for the affected systems to get issues closed.

A growing part of the team’s work is also developing agentic offensive security tooling: LLM-driven systems that encode operator tradecraft and apply it continuously. You will help in the design of that tooling and prove it out on live assessments.

You will also help to coordinate third‑party penetration testing engagements, scoping the work with specialized external firms, keeping assessments focused on the risks that matter, and turning their results into concrete remediation.

• Conduct hybrid web application penetration tests that combine source code review with runtime exploitation across our products and internal tooling.
• Perform external network penetration tests against internet-facing infrastructure, identifying exposed services, misconfigurations, and paths to obtain an initial foothold.
• Perform internal network and Active Directory security assessments, identifying privilege escalation paths, lateral movement opportunities, and misconfigurations.
• Assess the security of cloud and containerized infrastructure, including identity, network, and workload configurations.
• Collaborate with detection engineering to validate telemetry and detection coverage against real‑world attack techniques uncovered during engagements.
• Scope and manage third‑party pentest engagements end‑to‑end, critically review results, and work cross‑functionally to convert findings into prioritized, actionable remediation.
• Partner with engineering to reproduce, prioritize, and verify fixes for the issues that are surfaced.
• Design and build offensive security tooling and automation tailored to Palantir's stack.
• Author clear, actionable write‑ups and readouts for technical and non‑technical stakeholders, translating findings into business risk and prioritized action.
• Demonstrated strength in web application penetration testing, with the ability to move fluidly between source code review and runtime testing.
• Demonstrated strength in external and internal network penetration testing, from enumerating and exploiting internet‑facing attack surface to establishing a foothold and expanding access once inside.
• Hands‑on experience with standard offensive security tooling, including Burp Suite, BloodHound/SharpHound, Certipy, Impacket, Responder, Pacu/ScoutSuite, Nuclei, etc.
• A builder's instinct: comfortable writing code to automate testing, develop proof‑of‑concept exploits, or to fill gaps in existing tooling.
• Working knowledge of how modern software is built and shipped, including CI/CD pipelines and infrastructure‑as‑code, and an eye for how those systems become attack paths of their own.
• Working knowledge of cloud, container, and orchestration security principles, and an understanding of how common misconfigurations turn into real attack paths.
• Working knowledge of chaining identity and cloud attack paths end to end, from Kerberos abuse, delegation misconfigurations, and ADCS/SCCM exploitation in large multi‑domain Active Directory forests through to IMDS abuse, IAM privilege escalation, and SSRF‑driven pivots into cloud control planes.
• Offensive security certifications (e.g. OSCP, OSWE), or a track record in CTF competitions or bug bounty programs, are a plus but not required.
• 4+ years of professional experience in offensive security, penetration testing, red teaming, or a closely related field.
• Willingness and eligibility to obtain a U.S. security clearance preferred.
• Proficiency in at least one scripting or programming language (e.g. Python, Go) sufficient to build and adapt your own testing tooling.
• Demonstrated experience assessing the security of cloud (AWS, Azure, or GCP) and containerized (Docker, Kubernetes) environments.
• Excellent organizational instincts, with the ability to keep multiple streams of work moving in parallel and to track each through to verified completion.
• Clear written and verbal communication, including the ability to explain a vulnerability, its impact, and its fix to the engineers who need to act on it.

Salary

The estimated salary range for this position is estimated to be $145,000 - $200,000/year. Total compensation for this position may also include Restricted Stock units, sign‑on bonus and other potential future incentives. Further note that total compensation for this position will be determined by each individual’s relevant qualifications, work experience, skills, and other factors. This estimate excludes the value of any potential sign‑on bonus; the value of any benefits offered; and the potential future value of any long‑term incentives.

Our benefits aim to promote health and wellbeing across all areas of Palantirians’ lives. We work to continuously improve our offerings and listen to our community as we design and update them. The list below details our available benefits and some of the perks that can be enjoyed as an employee of Palantir Technologies.

Benefits

• Employees (and their eligible dependents) can enroll in medical, dental, and vision insurance as well as voluntary life insurance
• Employees are automatically covered by Palantir’s basic life, AD&D and disability insurance
• Commuter benefits
• Relocation assistance
• Take what you need paid time off, not accrual based
• 2 weeks paid time off built into the end of each year (subject to team and business needs)
• 10 paid holidays throughout the calendar year
• Supportive leave of absence program including time off for military service and medical events
• Paid leave for new parents and subsidized back‑up care for all parents
• Fertility and family building benefits including but not limited to adoption, surrogacy, and preservation
• Stipend to help with expenses that come with a new child
• Employees can enroll in Palantir’s 401k plan

Life at Palantir

We want every Palantirian to achieve their best outcomes, that’s why we celebrate individuals’ strengths, skills, and interests, from your first interview to your longterm growth, rather than rely on traditional career ladders. Paying attention to the needs of our community enables us to optimize our opportunities to grow and helps ensure many pathways to success at Palantir. Promoting health and well‑being across all areas of Palantirians’ lives is just one of the ways we’re investing in our community. Learn more at Life at Palantir and note that our offerings may vary by region.

In keeping consistent with Palantir’s values and culture, we believe employees are better together and in‑person work affords the opportunity for more creative outcomes. Therefore, we encourage employees to work from our offices to foster connectivity and innovation. Many teams do offer hybrid options (WFH a day or two a week), allowing our employees to strike the right trade‑off for their personal productivity. Based on business need, there are a few roles that allow for “Remote” work on an exceptional basis. If you are applying for one of these roles, you must work from the state in which you are employed. If the posting is specified as Onsite, you are required to work from an office.

Palantir values excellence regardless of background. We are proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer for all, including but not limited to Veterans and those with disabilities. Palantir is committed to making the application and hiring process accessible to everyone and will provide a reasonable accommodation for those living with a disability. If you need an accommodation for the application or hiring process, please reach out and let us know how we can help.

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