Lead Software Engineer (Architect)

Mastercard is hiring a Lead Software Engineer (Architect). Level rates it ; you can apply on Mastercard.

Level's read on this job

On Level's scale, this software engineer role is Little AI ●○○○: aI is not part of the work.
Tools and skills the posting cites include software architecture, technical leadership and emv 3ds.
Level classifies it as a lead role.
Level lists 1,000+ other open roles at Mastercard.
The role was posted within the past two weeks.

AI in this role

Lead the architecture and development of Mastercard's next-generation secure digital authentication and 3DS server platform.

software-architecturetechnical-leadershipemv-3dsdistributed-systems

Our Purpose

Mastercard powers economies and empowers people in 200+ countries and territories worldwide. Together with our customers, we’re helping build a sustainable economy where everyone can prosper. We support a wide range of digital payments choices, making transactions secure, simple, smart and accessible. Our technology and innovation, partnerships and networks combine to deliver a unique set of products and services that help people, businesses and governments realize their greatest potential.

Title and Summary

Lead Software Engineer (Architect)

Mastercard powers economies and empowers people in more than 200 countries and territories worldwide. Together with our customers, we are building a sustainable economy where everyone can prosper. We support digital payment choices that make transactions secure, simple, smart and accessible. Through secure networks, trusted partnerships and innovation, we help individuals, financial institutions, governments and businesses realize their greatest potential.

Overview
The Mastercard Authentication Program delivers authentication solutions that enable secure digital commerce globally.
Smart Interface is Mastercard’s EMV 3-D Secure 3DS Server platform and a critical component of the EMVCo 3DS ecosystem, enabling secure, scalable and standards-compliant communication across merchants, gateways, acquirers, Directory Servers and issuer Access Control Servers.

We are seeking a highly experienced Lead Software Engineer (Architect) to provide technical leadership and help define and drive the long-term architecture and technology strategy of the Smart Interface platform. The successful candidate will combine deep software engineering and architectural expertise, EMV 3DS domain knowledge, and hands-on technical leadership to drive the design, development, and evolution of Mastercard’s next-generation authentication platform.

Role
Software Engineering & Technical Leadership
• Lead the design, development and evolution of Smart Interface.
• Translate business, product and technical requirements into scalable, maintainable and secure solutions.
• Provide hands-on leadership across design, development, testing, deployment, production readiness and support.
• Own and evolve platform architecture and contribute to technical roadmaps aligned with business and product strategy.
• Guide engineers through complex technical decisions and lead code and design reviews.
• Design highly available, low-latency transaction systems and cloud-native distributed applications using microservices, APIs and event-driven architectures.
• Define integration and API standards and lead modernization initiatives that improve scalability, performance and maintainability.
• Apply software design, architecture, Domain-Driven Design and data-structure principles to distributed systems.
• Develop reusable components, frameworks and engineering patterns.
• Apply secure coding, encryption, authentication, TLS/mTLS, certificate management and secrets management practices.
• Design for resilience using fault isolation, retry strategies, disaster recovery and multi-region deployment.
• Promote unit, functional and integration testing, performance engineering, observability and production diagnostics.
• Troubleshoot complex issues, perform root-cause analysis and address technical debt and engineering risks.

EMV 3DS Domain Leadership
• Serve as a technical lead for Mastercard’s 3DS Server platform.
• Lead development of EMV 3DS capabilities supporting current and future EMVCo standards.
• Drive adoption of emerging authentication technologies and ensure interoperability across merchants, gateways, acquirers, Directory Servers and ACS providers.
• Partner with product, engineering, architecture and standards teams to evolve authentication capabilities.

Leadership & Influence
• Mentor engineers and technical leads in software design, development and engineering practices.
• Communicate technical decisions, trade-offs and recommendations to engineering, product and business stakeholders.
• Influence technical direction without direct authority and foster collaboration and continuous improvement.

All About You
Required Qualifications
• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering or a related discipline.
• 15+ years of software engineering experience, including significant technical leadership responsibilities.
• Proven experience designing and delivering large-scale distributed enterprise applications and platforms.
• Strong cloud engineering experience across Azure, AWS, GCP or equivalent platforms, including containerization.
• Hands-on development experience with Java and Spring Boot.
• Deep expertise in microservices, REST APIs, OpenAPI specifications, API-first design, event-driven architectures and distributed systems.
• Experience building high-volume, low-latency transactional applications.
• Advanced experience with software design and development, code review, testing, troubleshooting and production support.
• Strong understanding of data structures, relational and NoSQL databases, performance engineering, observability and secure coding practices.

EMV 3DS & Payments Expertise
• Deep knowledge of the EMV 3-D Secure ecosystem and authentication flows.
• Experience with 3DS Servers, Directory Servers, Access Control Servers, authentication services, tokenization platforms, payment gateways or card-payment processing systems.
• Strong understanding of digital identity, authentication protocols, fraud prevention, payment participants and transaction lifecycles.
• Understanding of regulations affecting digital authentication and payments.
Leadership Competencies
• Strong technical problem-solving, strategic thinking, communication and stakeholder-management skills.
• Ability to translate complex technical concepts into business outcomes.
• Proven experience mentoring engineers and working across globally distributed teams.

Preferred Qualifications
• Experience developing or supporting a commercial EMV 3DS Server platform and EMVCo certification/compliance.
• Knowledge of Mastercard Authentication products and services.
• Experience supporting high-volume payment platforms.
• Knowledge of PSD2 SCA and related authentication regulations.
• Experience with tokenization, digital credentials or identity verification.
• Familiarity with biometrics, FIDO2, passkeys, Kafka, SRE, DevSecOps and CI/CD.

Success Measures
• Provide hands-on technical and architectural leadership for Smart Interface.
• Deliver scalable, resilient, secure and maintainable solutions while improving quality, performance and operability.
• Drive architectural consistency, simplify integrations and accelerate delivery through reusable components and standards.
• Mentor engineers and help evolve Mastercard authentication technologies.

Corporate Security Responsibility
All activities involving access to Mastercard assets, information and networks carry inherent risk. Every person working for or on behalf of Mastercard must:
• Follow Mastercard security policies and practices.
• Protect the confidentiality, integrity and availability of information assets.
• Report suspected security incidents or violations.
• Complete required security and compliance training.
• Support Mastercard’s commitment to secure, resilient and trusted payment solutions.

Mastercard is a merit-based, inclusive, equal opportunity employer that considers applicants without regard to gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, disabled or veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. We hire the most qualified candidate for the role. In the US or Canada, if you require accommodations or assistance to complete the online application process or during the recruitment process, please contact reasonable_accommodation@mastercard.com and identify the type of accommodation or assistance you are requesting. Do not include any medical or health information in this email. The Reasonable Accommodations team will respond to your email promptly.

Corporate Security Responsibility

All activities involving access to Mastercard assets, information, and networks comes with an inherent risk to the organization and, therefore, it is expected that every person working for, or on behalf of, Mastercard is responsible for information security and must:

Abide by Mastercard’s security policies and practices;
Ensure the confidentiality and integrity of the information being accessed;
Report any suspected information security violation or breach, and
Complete all periodic mandatory security trainings in accordance with Mastercard’s guidelines.

In line with Mastercard’s total compensation philosophy and assuming that the job will be performed in the US, the successful candidate will be offered a competitive base salary and may be eligible for an annual bonus or commissions depending on the role. The base salary offered may vary depending on multiple factors, including but not limited to location, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience. Mastercard benefits for full time (and certain part time) employees generally include: insurance (including medical, prescription drug, dental, vision, disability, life insurance); flexible spending account and health savings account; paid leaves (including 16 weeks of new parent leave and up to 20 days of bereavement leave); 80 hours of Paid Sick and Safe Time, 25 days of vacation time and 5 personal days, pro-rated based on date of hire; 10 annual paid U.S. observed holidays; 401k with a best-in-class company match; deferred compensation for eligible roles; fitness reimbursement or on-site fitness facilities; eligibility for tuition reimbursement; and many more. Mastercard benefits for interns generally include: 56 hours of Paid Sick and Safe Time; jury duty leave; and on-site fitness facilities in some locations. THIS POSTING RELECTS ONE OR MORE CURRENT VACANCIES ON OUR TEAM, AND MASTERCARD INTENDS TO FILL THIS POSITION BY 01/12/2027. If the fill date has passed, Mastercard intends to fill this position as soon as possible.

Pay Ranges

O'Fallon, Missouri: $140,000 - $231,000 USD

How we rate this

Lead Software Engineer (Architect) at Mastercard rates 0 out of 100 for how much of the daily work is AI. That makes it Little AI (AI Level 1 of 4). The level is about AI in the job, not seniority.

Classification

Little AI. AI is not part of the work.

●●●● Builds AI80 to 100
●●●○ Works on AI60 to 79
●●○○ Uses AI40 to 59
●○○○ Little AI0 to 39

Levels come from how often the tools, models and workflows of the role are named in the posting itself. Read the description and count the AI tools, models and workflows it names.

Key facts

Lead Software Engineer (Architect) is an open job at Mastercard.
Level rates this role AI Level 1 of 4: Little AI.
The role is based in O'Fallon, Missouri.
The job was posted on October 23, 2026.
Seniority: lead.
Applications are handled by Mastercard. Apply on Mastercard

Prepare for this job

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Skills and AI tools this role asks for

Software ArchitectureTechnical LeadershipEmv 3dsDistributed Systems

Also common in software engineer jobs at this level

Python C++Kubernetes TypeScript React Docker

Pay

Typical software engineer job: $168k

This posting doesn't list pay. Use the typical software engineer figure when pay comes up. See software engineer jobs

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