Senior Incident Response Analyst

TikTok USDS Joint Venture; Washington (District of Columbia); On-site; USD 132,000 - 337,000; Full time

Job summary

TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC is seeking a proactive IR Analyst based in Washington, DC, to monitor, investigate, contain, and recover from sophisticated threats targeting TikTok's US operations. You will join a high-stakes SOC team that collaborates with global counterparts to drive incident response and post-incident analysis.

Responsibilities include leading technical response actions, performing deep investigations, and coordinating with cross-functional teams to minimize business impact

Qualifications

• 5+ years of experience triaging, managing, investigating, and remediating high-severity security incidents.
• Proven ability to lead global investigations across diverse data sources and regions.
• Deep hands-on Linux/Unix command line experience for system interrogation and log work.
• Experience with cloud forensics across multi-cloud environments and container forensics.

Responsibilities

• Drive technical response actions to protect stakeholders and users from fast-paced threats.
• Conduct comprehensive investigations and root-cause analysis to guide remediation.
• Coordinate with Hunt, Cyber Threat Intelligence, Legal, and Infrastructure teams.
• Transform chaotic signals into clear actions to ensure infrastructure resiliency.

Skills

Incident response

Global investigations

Linux/Unix

Cloud forensics

Threat hunting

Team leadership

Communication

AI-assisted security

Tools

Docker

Kubernetes

PCAP analysis

Zeek logs

Job description

Responsibilities

About the Team

The TikTok USDS JV Security Operations Center (SOC) is responsible for global around-the-clock monitoring, response, mitigation, and resolution of critical security events to protect and defend TikTok US data, infrastructure, customers, users, and products. Aside from monitoring TikTok US infrastructure and networks for indicators of anomalies, breach, and/or unauthorized access, the SOC is responsible for leading response efforts to enterprise-wide incidents, including post-incident root-cause analysis and recovery efforts, as well as leading proactive investigations into threats otherwise unidentified, developing and maintaining response plans, playbooks, and procedures.

About the Role

This role is based in our Converged Security Operations Center in Washington, D.C., working closely in a follow-the-sun model with our global SOC counterparts in London and Sydney.

This is a highly proactive, technical, and high-stakes role. It requires a high degree of autonomy and a self-starter mentality - driven by an unwavering passion to defend the enterprise and minimize impact during critical security incidents.

As an IR Analyst, you will belong to a team of strong people, processes, and technologies responsible for monitoring, investigation, containing, eradicating, and recovering from sophisticated threats targeting TikTok's US operations, users, and infrastructure.

As a key member of the SOC, you will effectively fuse an understanding of the global threat landscape with deep knowledge of our US-based business operations to lead incident identification, investigation, cross-team management, containment strategies, and remediation efforts that make tangible impacts to the security of the business.

Responsibilities

• You will drive technical response actions to protect our stakeholders and US-based users from increasingly fast-paced and AI-driven threats and attackers, including develop and tuning alerts to quickly identify anomalous and/or malicious activity occurring within TikTok USDS JV infrastructure.


• You will leverage AI-driven and agentic tools and methodologies, paired closely with your investigative and problem-solving skills to conduct comprehensive investigations and root-cause analysis to guide the business in unearthing, evicting, and recovering from attacks from sophisticated threat actors.


• You will collaborate closely with a variety of partner teams, including the Hunt team, Cyber Threat Intelligence, Digital Forensics, Legal, and Infrastructure teams to coordinate seamless, effective, and efficient operations.


• To be most successful in this role, you must excel in highly complex, ambiguous situations, transforming chaotic incident signals into clear paths forward to ensure the resiliency of our critical US operational infrastructure, customers, users, and data.

Qualifications

Minimum Qualifications

• 5+ years of experience directly triaging, managing, investigating, and remediating high-severity security incidents


• Proven experience and capability leading teams in performing deep and complex global investigations involving a multitude of disparate data sources from teams and regions spanning the globe


• Deep hands‑on Linux/Unix command line experience for low‑level system interrogation, log analysis, and artifact collection


• Hands‑on experience with cloud forensics and incident response across multi‑cloud infrastructure, including container and container‑level forensics (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes, container runtime logs) during active security investigations


• Must possess the ability to navigate the chaos of an active breach, make progress without prescriptive direction, proactively drive remediation solutions a high degree of integrity, and have the ability to lead and inspire change through post‑incident lessons learned

Preferred Qualifications:

• Demonstrated teamwork and collaboration skills in leading or contributing to global, multi‑functional incident response teams


• Demonstrated time management, problem‑solving, and strict effort prioritization and within multiple constraints


• Strong cross‑functional expertise across multiple IT operational, network, cloud, and security disciplines


• Excellent communication skills (verbal and written) with the ability to act as a technical leader or incident commander and influence without authority during crises


• Ability to effectively translate complex technical compromise details into clear executive summaries for a broad range of technical and non‑technical staff


• Strong understanding and aptitude toward leveraging AI tools to accelerate investigation speeds and response efficacy


• Excellent fundamental knowledge of industry‑standard incident handling frameworks (e.g., NIST SP 800‑61, ISO/IEC 27035, MITRE ATT&CK)


• Proven capability and experience in performing deep and complex network analysis using PCAP captures and Zeek logs to reconstruct threat activity and adversary C2 communications


• Proven experience with live incident identification, investigation, containment, eradication, and recovery from advanced persistent threats (APTs) and threat actor TTPs


• Tenured experience and efficiency in querying, parsing, and analyzing large‑scale datasets across large data warehouses and distributed data architectures

About USDS

TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC is dedicated to the safety and security of millions of Americans who create, discover, and connect with what they love on the apps we operate. The Joint Venture has been established in compliance with the Executive Order signed by President Trump on September 25, 2025. Our foundation is a comprehensive data privacy and cybersecurity program we operate under defined safeguards to protect national security and secure U.S. user data, apps and the algorithm. We safeguard the U.S. content ecosystem, holding decision‑making authority for trust and safety policies and moderation. USDS Joint Venture helps ensure Americans can continue to express their creativity, discover new hobbies and interests, and build thriving communities and businesses on a global scale.

On‑site presence across teams allows the company to operate with greater speed, alignment, and agility — especially in areas like real‑time decision‑making, team development, and integrated execution. As such, the company is shifting from a hybrid work model to a fully in‑person schedule up to 5 days a week.

Why Join Us

Inspiring creativity is at the core of TikTok's mission. Our innovative product is built to help people authentically express themselves, discover and connect – and our global, diverse teams make that possible. Together, we create value for our communities, inspire creativity and bring joy - a mission we work towards every day. We strive to do great things with great people. We lead with curiosity, humility, and a desire to make impact in a rapidly growing tech company. Every challenge is an opportunity to learn and innovate as one team. We're resilient and embrace challenges as they come. By constantly iterating and fostering an "Always Day 1" mindset, we achieve meaningful breakthroughs for ourselves, our company, and our users. When we create and grow together, the possibilities are limitless. Join us.

Diversity & Inclusion

TikTok is committed to creating an inclusive space where employees are valued for their skills, experiences, and unique perspectives. Our platform connects people from across the globe and so does our workplace. At TikTok, our mission is to inspire creativity and bring joy. To achieve that goal, we are committed to celebrating our diverse voices and to creating an environment that reflects the many communities we reach. We are passionate about this and hope you are too.

USDS Reasonable Accommodation

USDS is committed to providing reasonable accommodations in our recruitment processes for candidates with disabilities, pregnancy, sincerely held religious beliefs or other reasons protected by applicable laws. If you need assistance or a reasonable accommodation, please reach out to us at https://tinyurl.com/USDS-RA

Job Information

【For Pay Transparency】 Compensation Description (Annually) - Washington, DC The base salary range for this position in the selected city is $ 132480 - $ 336960 annually. Compensation may vary outside of this range depending on a number of factors, including a candidate’s qualifications, skills, competencies and experience, and location. Base pay is one part of the Total Package that is provided to compensate and recognize employees for their work, and this role may be eligible for additional discretionary bonuses/incentives, and restricted stock units. Benefits may vary depending on the nature of employment and the country work location. Employees have day one access to medical, dental, and vision insurance, a 401(k) savings plan with company match, paid parental leave, short-term and long-term disability coverage, life insurance, wellbeing benefits, among others. Employees also receive 10 paid holidays per year, 10 paid sick days per year and 17 days of Paid Personal Time (prorated upon hire with increasing accruals by tenure). The Company reserves the right to modify or change these benefits programs at any time, with or without notice.