Staff Backend Engineer - Secure Access & Auth

Coinbase, Inc.; Columbia (SC); Hybrid; USD 218,000 - 257,000; Full time

Job summary

Coinbase is seeking a Staff Software Engineer for the Access & Authorization team. You will design and operate authentication and authorization systems affecting Coinbase's web, mobile, and API experiences, balancing security with a smooth user experience.

You will build Go-based, low-latency services, mentor engineers, and partner with product, security, fraud, and infra teams to scale access controls globally.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of backend software engineering experience with Go or similar systems language.
• Experience designing secure APIs, authentication/authorization, and token handling.
• Proficiency with gRPC, Protobufs, and data stores like Redis or DynamoDB.
• Strong ability to deliver complex cross‑functional projects and communicate clearly.

Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end design, implementation, and operation of auth capabilities.
• Build secure, low-latency Go services used across Coinbase products.
• Lead technical designs for advanced auth initiatives like passkeys and edge authorization.
• Collaborate with product, security, fraud, and infra teams to balance needs.
• Create self-service tooling so teams adopt access controls safely at scale.
• Mentor engineers via design reviews, pairing, and on-call participation.

Skills

Go

Distributed systems

OAuth 2.0

OIDC

JWTs

gRPC

Protobufs

Redis

DynamoDB

Code reviews

Job description

Coinbase is seeking a Staff Software Engineer for the Access & Authorization team. You will design and operate authentication and authorization systems affecting Coinbase's web, mobile, and API experiences, balancing security with a smooth user experience.

You will build Go-based, low-latency services, mentor engineers, and partner with product, security, fraud, and infra teams to scale access controls globally.