Senior Security Engineer, Special Projects

Amazon is hiring a Senior Security Engineer, Special Projects in Seattle, United States. It pays $178k-$227k a year and Level rates it ; you can apply on Amazon.

Level's read on this job

Little AI ●○○○ is how Level rates this cybersecurity role: aI is not part of the work.
Pay on this posting starts 12% higher than the typical cybersecurity posting on Level.
Level classes it as a senior role.
Amazon has 21,000+ other open roles on Level.
Posted in the last few days.

AI in this role

Innovators wanted! Are you an entrepreneur? A builder? A dreamer? This role is part of an Amazon Special Projects team that takes the company’s Think Big leadership principle to the extreme. We focus on creating entirely new products and services with a goal of positively impacting the lives of our customers. No industries or subject areas are out of bounds. We launched products such as Comprehend Medical, Echo Frames and Amazon Explore. If you’re interested in innovating at scale to address big challenges in the world, this is the team for you.

As the Sr. Security Engineer, you will own the end-to-end threat model and translate it into concrete engineering deliverables: hardware attestation for compute nodes, encrypted workload delivery, result integrity verification, API authentication, and workload isolation guarantees. You will work across every component — reviewing the runtime's sandbox model, the scheduler's trust assumptions, the API surface, and the network layer's encryption — to ensure the system is secure by design.

Key job responsibilities
- Author the threat model for the platform architecture, identifying attack surfaces across compute nodes, network transit, and the control plane.
- Design and implement the attestation flow that verifies node integrity before workloads are dispatched, leveraging TPM/TEE where available and defining fallback assurance levels.
- Specify and validate encrypted workload delivery, ensuring model weights and inference inputs/outputs are protected at rest and in transit.
- Build result integrity verification mechanisms, conduct security reviews, lead penetration test preparation, and author compliance documentation.

About the team
Amazon Special Projects is building distributed infrastructure that operates across compute environments Amazon does not fully control. That sentence alone should tell you why this role matters. You will design the trust model that makes this architecture viable: ensuring that workloads are protected, results are verifiable, and the platform meets a bar that earns the confidence of internal and external customers. Security is not a layer we bolt on — it is a constraint that shapes every design decision from day one.

Basic qualifications

- Knowledge of at least two of the following programming languages: Scala, Java, Python, C/C++, or Go
- Experience (non-internship) in troubleshooting systems issues, analyzing logs, or automating complex tasks using command line tools
- Experience (non-internship) in industry-based security vulnerabilities identification, attack patterns, and remediation techniques
- Experience as a mentor, tech lead or leading an engineering team
- Experience with threat modeling and penetration testing, or experience that includes strong analytical skills, attention to detail, and effective communication abilities and experience in Linux and Networking protocols
- Deep expertise in hardware attestation (TPM, TEE, secure enclaves) and cryptographic protocols
- 7+ years of experience in security engineering, with at least 3 years focused on systems or infrastructure security
- Strong understanding of zero-trust architectures and their practical implementation
- Experience with secure API design, authentication, and authorization frameworks

Preferred qualifications

- Experience applying threat modeling or other risk identification techniques or equivalent
- Knowledge of cloud computing services and deployment architecture
- Experience performing technical audits/assessments in direct support of a major compliance effort (e.g., ISO, NIST, SOX, PCI, HIPAA, GDPR and other regulatory/industry certifications)
- Experience securing edge or distributed platforms where hardware is not under direct organizational control
- Background in secure enclave programming (Intel SGX, ARM TrustZone, or AWS Nitro Enclaves)
- Familiarity with ML model protection, including model watermarking or obfuscation techniques
- Published research or patents in applied cryptography, remote attestation, or secure computation

Amazon is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of protected veteran status, disability, or other legally protected status.

Our inclusive culture empowers Amazonians to deliver the best results for our customers. If you have a disability and need a workplace accommodation or adjustment during the application and hiring process, including support for the interview or onboarding process, please visit https://amazon.jobs/content/en/how-we-hire/accommodations for more information. If the country/region you’re applying in isn’t listed, please contact your Recruiting Partner.

The base salary range for this position is listed below. Your Amazon package will include sign-on payments and restricted stock units (RSUs). Final compensation will be determined based on factors including experience, qualifications, and location. Amazon also offers comprehensive benefits including health insurance (medical, dental, vision, prescription, Basic Life & AD&D insurance and option for Supplemental life plans, EAP, Mental Health Support, Medical Advice Line, Flexible Spending Accounts, Adoption and Surrogacy Reimbursement coverage), 401(k) matching, paid time off, and parental leave. Learn more about our benefits at https://amazon.jobs/en/benefits.

USA, WA, Seattle - 178,400.00 - 226,700.00 USD annually

How we rate this

Senior Security Engineer, Special Projects at Amazon rates 32 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.