Sophos is seeking an experienced and motivated Senior Penetration Testing Analyst 1 to join our Red Team. The Sophos Red Team is engaged by organizations worldwide to identify and exploit vulnerabilities within client environments, applying information security threat intelligence to uncover the same weaknesses real-world adversaries would target.
As a Senior Penetration Testing Analyst 1, you will act as the point of contact for testing readiness, coordinating tasks, timelines, and communication between business, client, and project teams. Responsible for escalating issues to management and taking ownership of new challenges to add value. In addition to test readiness support, the position will focus on either application security (web application penetration testing, mobile, API testing) or network security (vulnerability assessments, external penetration tests, internal penetration tests, etc.), using both off-the-shelf and internally developed tools to execute manual testing for advanced attacks. Candidates are not expected to be experienced in both focus areas, although that would be a plus.
In this role, you will be responsible for test readiness activities to ensure engagements are ready to begin by troubleshooting client readiness problems, communicating with clients and tracking readiness status, and producing professional security assessment reports detailing vulnerability and exploit information for clients. This position will lead client-facing calls throughout each engagement, from test readiness and troubleshooting, project kick-off through notification of high and critical findings to a close-out review of test findings, evidence, process steps to reproduce, and remediation recommendations.
The ideal candidate for this role will bring strong technical communication skills, sound analytical and problem-solving abilities, and a proactive approach to researching new threats, vulnerabilities, and exploits.
You will excel as both a self-directed individual contributor and as a member of a larger team, performing other essential duties as assigned.
What you will do
- This is a remote position with potential travel up to 10%
- Coordinate activities, documentation, readiness schedules, and information between business, clients, and project teams.
- Act as the point of contact and communicate testing readiness status adequately to all participants
- Use project management tools to monitor key tasks, responsible parties, timelines, and status
- Report and escalate issues to management as needed
- Take ownership for accomplishing new and different requests; exploring opportunities to add value to job accomplishments.
- Conduct application security assessments (web, mobile, API, etc.) using off-the-shelf or internally developed exploitation tools to execute manual testing for advanced attacks OR network penetration testing assessments (external pen test, internal pen test, etc.)
- Produce and deliver vulnerability and exploit information to clients in the form of a professional security assessment report
- Conduct client conference calls, including but not limited to test readiness and troubleshooting calls, project kick-off calls, notification of high/critical findings during the testing process, and close-out calls to review test findings, evidence, process steps to reproduce, and remediation recommendations
- Perform proactive research to identify and understand new threats, vulnerabilities, and exploits
- Conduct exploitation testing using off-the-shelf or self-developed exploitation tools and document findings for client remediation
- Excel as both a self-directed individual contributor and as a member of a larger team
What you will bring
- 5+ years of experience in Information Security
- Excellent client-facing and internal communication skills, both written and verbal
- Demonstrate ability to learn quickly and thrive in high-energy team environment
- Professional, “get it done" attitude, work ethic, and strong team player
- Solid organizational skills including attention to detail and multitasking skills
- Minimum of 2 years of experience with penetration testing
- Minimum of 2 years of experience with at least one of the following: Nmap, Metasploit, Kali Linux, Burp Suite
- Experience with NMap Scanning
- Understanding of web application authentication methods
- Understanding of API’s
- Understanding SOAPUI/Restlet and other tools for testing API’s
- Understanding of API Authentication Methods
- Experience with Linux
- Understanding of networking and appliances (routers, load balancers, firewalls, WAF, IDS/IPS, web content filter/proxy)
- Understanding of tools to validate network access with a penetration testing platform
- Offensive certifications such as CEH, WAPT, GPEN, GWAPT, GAWN, OSCP, etc.
- Knowledge of NetSparker and AppScan; operating systems administration and internals (Microsoft Windows / Linux)
- Understanding of TCP/IP networking at a technical level
- Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related technical field; or equivalent professional experience
- Experience with various application attack vectors, security test processes, and strong knowledge of common vulnerabilities (i.e. OWASP Top 10)
- Working knowledge of SQL and high-level languages
- Good troubleshooting skills, technical communication skills, both written and verbal; good analytical and problem-solving skills
Desirable:
Skills Required
- 5+ years of experience in information security
- At least 2 years of penetration testing experience
- At least 2 years of experience with one or more of Nmap, Metasploit, Kali Linux, or Burp Suite
- Experience with Nmap scanning
- Understanding of web application authentication methods
- Understanding of APIs and API authentication methods
- Understanding of SOAPUI, Restlet, or other API testing tools
- Experience with Linux
- Understanding of networking appliances, including routers, load balancers, firewalls, WAFs, IDS/IPS, and web proxies
- Understanding of tools used to validate network access with penetration testing platforms
- Excellent written and verbal client-facing and internal communication skills
- Strong organizational, multitasking, troubleshooting, analytical, and problem-solving skills
- CEH, WAPT, GPEN, GWAPT, GAWN, OSCP, or other offensive security certification
- Knowledge of NetSparker and AppScan
- Operating systems administration and internals, including Microsoft Windows and Linux
- Technical understanding of TCP/IP networking
- Bachelor of Science in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or related field
- Experience with application attack vectors, security testing processes, and common vulnerabilities such as OWASP Top 10
- Working knowledge of SQL and high-level programming languages
- Legal authorization to work in the posted jurisdiction without employer sponsorship
Sophos Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Sophos and has not been reviewed or approved by Sophos.
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Leave & Time Off Breadth — Time away is positioned as broad, with company-wide wellness days plus dedicated learning days and paid volunteer time.
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Parental & Family Support — Family-related leave appears more comprehensive than baseline offerings, including paid parental leave, caregiver leave, and extended bereavement leave.
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Wellbeing & Lifestyle Benefits — Wellbeing support is emphasized through always-available assistance resources and a Calm subscription, suggesting a lifestyle-oriented benefits approach.
Sophos Insights
What We Do
Cybersecurity Evolved. As a worldwide leader in next-generation cybersecurity, Sophos protects nearly 400,000 organizations of all sizes in more than 150 countries from today’s most advanced cyberthreats. Powered by SophosLabs – a global threat intelligence and data science team – Sophos’ cloud-native and AI-enhanced solutions secure endpoints (laptops, servers and mobile devices) and networks against evolving cybercriminal tactics and techniques, including automated and active-adversary breaches, ransomware, malware, exploits, data exfiltration, phishing, and more.
