Software Engineer, Backend & Cloud

About the Company:

World is building a real human network designed to accelerate people in the age of AI. As bots and autonomous agents reshape the internet, people, institutions, and applications need a trusted way to confirm who is a real human while preserving privacy. Our products make this possible: the Orb verifies real people, World ID proves it privately, and World App enables and distributes the new applications made possible by this technology. Together, they form a new layer for AI internet.

We’re one of the fastest-growing networks in tech. More than 17 million people across 160 countries have verified with World ID, and we complete over 350,000 verifications each week. World App is already among the most used wallets globally. Developers are integrating World ID to build safer online experiences and create spaces where real people can participate, earn, and be recognized in ways AI simply can’t replicate.

World was founded in 2019 and launched globally in 2023. We are more than 400 people across hardware, software, AI, cryptography, mobile engineering, and global operations. Our teams come from OpenAI, Tesla, SpaceX, Apple, Google, Stripe, Meta, Coinbase, Palantir and MIT Media Lab. We’re backed by leading investors, including a16z, Khosla Ventures, Bain Capital Crypto, Blockchain Capital, Variant, Tiger Global, and Coinbase Ventures, as well as prominent operators and founders across fintech and AI.

World has been featured on the cover of TIME Magazine, highlighted in Fast Company’s Next 5 in Fintech, and explored in a Bloomberg deep dive. The New York Times, Bankless and TechCrunch have all recognized our progress in identity, cryptography, AI, and global-scale hardware deployment. Our leadership is also named to the Time AI 100. Learn more about the newest product launches from our Unwrapped event.

You’ll join a backend/platform team that owns APIs, data, and cloud infrastructure end-to-end. We build and operate:

• Node.js/TypeScript services and serverless workloads

• GraphQL (Hasura) over Postgres, with typed contracts and codegen

• Event-driven pipelines (SQS/EventBridge/Lambda) and scheduled tasks

• AWS foundations (CDK, IAM, networking, observability, CI/CD)

This IC4 role partners closely with product and infra and actively uplevels backend teammates, enabling faster delivery and reliable operations.

• Design and evolve service boundaries, API contracts (GraphQL/REST), and data models over Postgres/Hasura.

• Build robust Node.js/TypeScript services and serverless endpoints (Lambda/API Gateway), with strict typing and codegen.

• Lead AWS infrastructure design with CDK: IAM least-privilege, VPC/networking, SQS/EventBridge, CloudFront/S3, CloudWatch.

• Drive reliability and performance: caching, pagination strategies, connection pooling, backpressure, idempotency, and rate limiting.

• Own migrations and schema lifecycle: author safe SQL/Hasura migrations; plan rollout/rollback strategies.

• Establish gold-standard observability: structured logging, metrics, tracing (Datadog), SLOs/alerts/runbooks.

• Harden security: Auth0, secrets/KMS, data access boundaries, audit trails.

• Optimize cost and scale: right-size compute, tune DB, leverage CDN/edge and async pipelines.

• Mentor IC3 engineers; review designs; set engineering standards and elevate team execution.

• Collaborate with frontend partners to align API ergonomics and performance budgets.

• Deep experience building and operating backend systems in Node.js/TypeScript.

• Expert with AWS primitives (Lambda, API Gateway, SQS, EventBridge, CloudFront, S3, CloudWatch) and IaC (CDK/Terraform).

• Strong SQL/Postgres fundamentals (indices, query plans, transactions, locks) and production tuning.

• GraphQL experience (ideally Hasura): schema design, permissions, actions, and performance.

• Proven track record leading multi-sprint backend initiatives and improving system reliability.

• Security-minded: IAM design, least privilege, secret management, threat modeling for APIs/PII.

• Excellent communication; able to mentor and drive cross-functional alignment.

• Frontend familiarity (Next.js/React/TypeScript) as a secondary skill for collaboration.

• Event-driven architectures at scale

• Edge/SSR caching patterns; API contract testing and consumer-driven tests.

• OpenNext/serverless Next.js, API observability at the edge.

• Experience with CI/CD, feature flags, canaries, and gradual rollouts.

• Pragmatic designs, small iterations, measurable outcomes.

• Type-safe contracts, codegen, and strong testing discipline.

• Clear RFCs/design docs, thoughtful code reviews, and blameless postmortems.

• Substantial professional experience with Node.js/TypeScript services and AWS.

• History of shipping production APIs over relational databases and operating them.

• Proficiency with Git and modern build/CI tooling.