Senior Data Security Analyst (Master) — Remote

GovCIO; Bismarck (ND); Remote; USD 125,000 - 150,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Employee Assistance Program (EAP)

Corporate Discounts

Learning & Development platform

Certification Assistance

Referral Bonus Program

Internal Mobility Program

Pet Insurance

Flexible Work Environment

Job summary

GovCIO is seeking a highly experienced Data Security Analyst — Master to lead design, implementation, operation, and continuous improvement of enterprise security controls protecting data, networks, applications, and cloud-connected environments.

This senior individual-contributor role requires hands-on expertise with the Palo Alto Networks security portfolio—particularly next-generation firewalls, Panorama, Cortex, and Strata—as well as strong Cisco networking and security capabilities.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's with 12+ years (or commensurate experience).
• 10+ years of progressive experience in cybersecurity, network security, security engineering, or security operations, including substantial hands‑on firewall administration and incident‑response experience.
• Deep expertise administering Palo Alto Networks next‑generation firewalls in complex enterprise environments.
• Advanced experience with Panorama, including centralized policy administration, device-group design, templates, HA workflows, logging, upgrades, troubleshooting, and configuration governance.
• Strong practical knowledge of Palo Alto Strata security capabilities, including NGFW architecture, App-ID, User-ID, Content-ID, security profiles, decryption, segmentation, and policy optimization.
• Strong experience using Palo Alto Cortex products or related XDR/EDR/SOAR/SIEM technologies for detection, investigation, incident response, threat hunting, and automation.
• Demonstrated ability to investigate and resolve complex network-security issues using packet captures, firewall traffic logs, threat logs, system logs, routing information, and endpoint telemetry.
• Strong Cisco networking background, including TCP/IP, DNS, DHCP, NAT, routing, switching, VLANs, VRFs, BGP/OSPF fundamentals, VPNs, network segmentation, and high-availability concepts.

Responsibilities

• Architect, deploy, administer, and optimize Palo Alto Networks next-generation firewalls across data center, campus, branch, cloud, and remote-access environments.
• Lead centralized firewall management using Palo Alto Panorama, including device groups, templates, template stacks, shared policy, role-based administration, configuration standards, software lifecycle management, and high-availability operations.
• Design and maintain security policies using least privilege, application-aware controls, user identity, URL filtering, DNS security, TLS decryption where approved, threat prevention, WildFire analysis, anti-spyware, vulnerability protection, and file-blocking capabilities.
• Lead the operational use of the Palo Alto Networks Strata portfolio to improve network security posture, policy consistency, visibility, segmentation, and operational resilience.
• Deploy and operationalize Cortex capabilities for security analytics, endpoint detection and response, extended detection and response, incident investigation, automation, orchestration, and response improvement, as applicable to the enterprise environment.
• Investigate security alerts, anomalous traffic, malware activity, policy violations, data-exfiltration indicators, and firewall-related incidents; coordinate containment, eradication, recovery, and post-incident review activities.
• Develop and tune detections, correlation logic, dashboards, investigations, and response playbooks using Cortex tooling and integrated security platforms.
• Build and maintain secure network segmentation strategies, including zone-based architecture, east-west traffic controls, microsegmentation principles, and protections for high-value data systems.

Skills

Firewall administration

Palo Alto Networks

Panorama

Cortex

Cisco networking

Incident response

Security analytics

Threat hunting

Education

Bachelor's degree

Tools

Palo Alto Panorama

Palo Alto Strata

Palo Alto Cortex

Cisco Secure Firewall/Firepower

Job description

GovCIO is seeking a highly experienced Data Security Analyst — Master to lead design, implementation, operation, and continuous improvement of enterprise security controls protecting data, networks, applications, and cloud-connected environments.

This senior individual-contributor role requires hands-on expertise with the Palo Alto Networks security portfolio—particularly next-generation firewalls, Panorama, Cortex, and Strata—as well as strong Cisco networking and security capabilities.