Research Staff, Adversarial Intelligence

Horizon3.ai; United States; Hybrid; USD 145,000 - 170,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Inclusive culture

Growth opportunities

Innovative culture

Hybrid & Remote work

Competitive compensation + benefits

Job summary

Horizon3.ai is hiring a Research Staff Member to work on research problems at the intersection of super intelligence, systems security, and agentic security. You will explore AI agents for security, autonomous pentesting, attack-path reasoning, cyber deception, AI safety, and evaluation of AI systems.

This role blends research with practical engineering to prototype methods and run experiments in real and simulated environments.

Qualifications

• Strong CS foundations and ability to reason about algorithms, systems, software, and data.
• Depth in systems security, super intelligence/ML, or related area, with interest across both AI and security.
• Strong programming ability; Python is useful; language choice is secondary to fundamentals.
• Ability to design careful experiments, analyze results, and distinguish evidence from intuition.

Responsibilities

• Conduct research on problems at the intersection of AI, cybersecurity, and computer systems.
• Formulate research questions from real technical challenges faced by Horizon3 and customers.
• Design and run experiments to test research hypotheses in controlled environments.
• Build research prototypes and implement methods with quality for meaningful evaluation.
• Study and evaluate modern AI techniques including LLMs, agentic systems, and reasoning methods.
• Analyze security data, attack paths, telemetry, and configurations.
• Read and critically evaluate literature and determine applicability to Horizon3's problems.
• Collaborate with researchers, engineers, product teams to evaluate solutions.
• Document methods, experiments, results, and limitations clearly.

Skills

CS fundamentals

Systems security depth

AI/ML interest

Programming skills

Python

Experiment design

Curiosity

Research & engineering

Technical communication

Problem solving

Education

BSc in Computer Science or related field

Job description

Get to Know Us
Horizon3.ai is a fast-growing, remote cybersecurity company dedicated to the mission of enabling organizations to proactively find, fix and verify exploitable attack vectors before criminals exploit them. Our flagship product, the NodeZeroTM platform, delivers production-safe autonomous pentests and other key assessment operations that scale across the largest internal, external, cloud, and hybrid cloud environments. NodeZero has been adopted by organizations of all sizes, from small educational institutions to government agencies and Global 100 enterprises. It is used by IT Ops/SecOps teams, consulting pentesters, and MSSPs and MSPs.

Get to Know Us
Horizon3.ai is a fast-growing, remote cybersecurity company dedicated to the mission of enabling organizations to proactively find, fix and verify exploitable attack vectors before criminals exploit them. Our flagship product, the NodeZeroTM platform, delivers production-safe autonomous pentests and other key assessment operations that scale across the largest internal, external, cloud, and hybrid cloud environments. NodeZero has been adopted by organizations of all sizes, from small educational institutions to government agencies and Global 100 enterprises. It is used by IT Ops/SecOps teams, consulting pentesters, and MSSPs and MSPs.
We are a fusion of former U.S. Special Operations cyber operators, startup engineers & operators, and formerly frustrated cybersecurity practitioners. We're committed to helping solve our common security problems: ineffective security tools and false positives, resulting in alert fatigue, blind spots, "checkbox" security culture, cybersecurity skills shortage, and the long lead time and expense of hiring outside consultants. Collectively, we are a team of learn it alls, committed to a culture of respect, collaboration, ownership, and results.

An Overview

We're looking for a Research Staff Member to join Horizon3 AI Research and work on research problems at the intersection of super intelligence, systems security, and agentic systems for security.

You'll investigate technical problems that arise from real security environments and help turn promising research ideas into methods, prototypes, experiments, and systems that can influence Horizon3's technology. Depending on the project, this may include AI agents for security, autonomous pentesting, attack-path reasoning, cyber deception, AI safety and security, security evaluation of AI systems, or new methods for reasoning over security data and environments.

This is not a purely academic research role and it is not a conventional software engineering role. We are looking for people who enjoy both understanding difficult technical problems and building systems that allow us to test those ideas in practice.

You do not need to arrive as an expert in both AI and systems security. You should have strong computer science foundations and meaningful depth in at least one of these areas, along with the curiosity and motivation to develop expertise in the other.

This role may be hired at the P1 (Entry) or P2 (Developing) level based on experience and demonstrated technical maturity. We expect junior researchers to receive mentorship and technical guidance as they develop greater independence.

What You’ll Do

• Conduct research on problems at the intersection of AI, cybersecurity, and computer systems.
• Formulate research questions from real technical challenges faced by Horizon3 and its customers.
• Design and run experiments that test research hypotheses in controlled and representative environments.
• Build research prototypes and implement methods with sufficient quality to support meaningful evaluation.
• Study and evaluate modern AI techniques, including large language models, agentic systems, reasoning methods, learning algorithms, and related approaches when relevant to the research problem.
• Analyze security systems, attack paths, telemetry, graphs, configurations, and other real-world security data.
• Read and critically evaluate academic and technical literature, identify relevant ideas, and determine how they apply to Horizon3's research problems.
• Work closely with researchers, attack engineers, security engineers, product teams, and other technical groups to understand problems and evaluate potential solutions.
• Document research methods, experiments, results, and limitations clearly and rigorously.
• Communicate research findings through internal presentations, technical reports, prototypes, and, when appropriate, academic publications or external research outputs.
• Develop greater research independence over time, including the ability to identify promising questions, propose technical approaches, and drive portions of a research project.

What You’ll Bring

• Strong foundations in computer science, including the ability to reason about algorithms, systems, software, and data.
• Technical depth in systems security, super intelligence / machine learning, or a closely related area, along with a strong interest in developing expertise across both AI and security.
• Strong programming skills and the ability to translate technical ideas into working implementations. Python experience is particularly useful, but we care more about strong programming fundamentals than a specific language.
• Ability to design careful experiments, analyze results, and distinguish evidence from intuition.
• Curiosity and willingness to investigate unfamiliar technical areas in depth.
• Interest in both research and engineering. You may be stronger in one than the other, but you should be comfortable moving between technical ideas, experiments, prototypes, and implementation.
• Ability to receive technical feedback, revise your approach, and learn from other researchers and engineers.
• Good technical judgment. We value ambitious exploration, but also careful reasoning about assumptions, limitations, risks, and unintended consequences.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.
• A degree in Computer Science or a related field, or equivalent technical experience.

What Sets You Apart

• Experience in systems security, offensive security, defensive security, penetration testing, vulnerability research, operating systems, networks, distributed systems, cloud security, or related areas.
• Experience with machine learning, deep learning, large language models, AI agents, reinforcement learning, planning, search, graph-based reasoning, or related AI methods.
• Experience conducting research through an academic research group, thesis, independent research project, internship, industrial research project, or comparable technical work.
• Experience designing experimental infrastructure, benchmarks, test environments, or evaluation frameworks.
• Experience building systems that operate on real-world data, environments, or security infrastructure rather than only clean benchmark datasets.
• Familiarity with security concepts such as attack paths, Active Directory, cloud environments, identity systems, network security, security controls, or adversarial techniques.
• Strong research publications, conference presentations, open-source contributions, or other evidence of high-quality technical work. Publications are valuable but are not required for this role.
• Experience working across research and engineering teams or contributing research ideas to practical systems.

Travel Required

We are a fully remote company, and this job may require up to 5% of travel to be successful.

Compensation And Values

At Horizon3, we believe that our people are our greatest asset, and our compensation philosophy reflects this core value. We are committed to fostering an environment where all employees feel valued, respected, and rewarded for their contributions. Our compensation structure is designed to be fair, competitive, and transparent, ensuring that every team member is recognized and compensated equitably across roles, levels, and locations.

In accordance with various State’s transparency regulations, we provide the following salary range information for this position:

• Base salary range: $145,000 - $170,000 annually. The exact salary will be determined based on the selected candidate’s location, qualifications, experience, and relevant skills.
• Additional compensation: All full-time roles are eligible for an equity package in the form of stock options.

Perks of Horizon3

• Inclusive Team: We value diversity and promote an inclusive culture where everyone can thrive.
• Growth Opportunities: Be part of a dynamic and growing team with numerous career development opportunities.
• Innovative Culture: Work in a collaborative environment that encourages creativity and out-of-the-box thinking.
• Hybrid & Remote Work: We embrace a mix of remote and hybrid work models depending on role and location, including our Chicago office, where some roles require regular in-office presence.
• Competitive Compensation: We offer competitive salary, equity and benefits. Our benefits include health, vision & dental insurance for you and your family, a flexible vacation policy, and generous parental leave.

You Belong Here

Horizon3 is not just an equal opportunity employer - we are a community that values diversity, equity, and inclusion as fundamental principles of our culture and success. We are dedicated to fostering a workplace where everyone feels welcome and respected, regardless of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, hair length or any other legally protected status by law.

Our commitment to diversity and inclusion means we strive to attract, develop, and retain a workforce that reflects the varied communities we serve. We believe that diverse perspectives drive innovation and strengthen our ability to create cutting-edge cybersecurity solutions. At Horizon3, every team member is valued and supported in an environment that encourages personal and professional growth.

We welcome candidates from all backgrounds and experiences, and we encourage all qualified individuals to apply. Come be a part of Horizon3, where your unique contributions are recognized, and your potential is limitless.

Other Duties

Please note this job description is not designed to cover or contain a comprehensive listing of activities, duties or responsibilities that are required of the employee. Duties, responsibilities, and activities may change at any time with or without notice.

Application Note

In any materials you submit, you may redact or remove age-identifying information such as age, date of birth, or dates of school attendance or graduation. You will not be penalized for redacting or removing this information.