Sr. Staff Engineer (Product Security Incident Response)

Our Mission

At Palo Alto Networks , we're united by a shared mission-to protect our digital way of life. We thrive at the intersection of innovation and impact, solving real-world problems with cutting-edge technology and bold thinking. Here, everyone has a voice, and every idea counts. If you're ready to do the most meaningful work of your career alongside people who are just as passionate as you are, you're in the right place.

Who We Are

In order to be the cybersecurity partner of choice, we must trailblaze the path and shape the future of our industry. This is something our employees work at each day and is defined by our values: Disruption, Collaboration, Execution, Integrity, and Inclusion. We weave AI into the fabric of everything we do and use it to augment the impact every individual can have. If you are passionate about solving real-world problems and ideating beside the best and the brightest, we invite you to join us!

We believe collaboration thrives in person. That's why most of our teams work from the office full time, with flexibility when it's needed. This model supports real-time problem-solving, stronger relationships, and the kind of precision that drives great outcomes.

Job Summary

As a Senior Staff PSIRT Engineer, you will play a critical role in protecting Palo Alto Networks products and services by leading complex vulnerability investigations and response efforts from start to finish. You will serve as a senior technical expert in the Product Security Incident Response Team (PSIRT), driving deep technical analysis, root cause determination, and remediation guidance for product security issues.

This role demands a high level of technical acumen, cross-functional collaboration, and the ability to navigate sensitive situations with both internal teams and external stakeholders such as customers, security researchers, and industry partners.

Your Impact

• Lead the technical investigation of reported security vulnerabilities in products and cloud offerings, including reproduction, impact analysis, and severity scoring (e.g., CVSS).
• Drive root cause analysis and partner with product engineering teams to develop, validate, and verify remediations.
• Collaborate closely with product, engineering, legal, privacy, support, sales, and threat intelligence teams to ensure aligned vulnerability handling and response strategies.
• Engage directly with customers, security researchers, and industry partners to discuss vulnerability details, mitigation steps, and disclosure timelines.
• Maintain deep familiarity with industry vulnerability handling standards and organizations such as CNA, NIST, FIRST, and OpenSSF.
• Contribute to the continuous improvement of PSIRT workflows, automation, and tooling to accelerate vulnerability detection, analysis, and remediation.
• Mentor junior engineers in vulnerability research, triage, and incident response methodologies.
• Produce high-quality technical documentation, incident reports, and executive summaries for both internal and external audiences.
• Stay up-to-date on emerging threats, exploitation techniques, and security research trends to proactively strengthen product security posture.

Qualifications

Your Experience

• 4+ years in product security, application security, vulnerability research, or related fields, with significant hands-on experience in vulnerability investigation and exploitation analysis.
• Strong expertise in reverse engineering, debugging, and secure software development practices.
• Demonstrated ability to reproduce, analyze, and assess the exploitability of complex vulnerabilities in large-scale systems or cloud environments.
• Deep familiarity with CVSS, CVE, and public vulnerability databases.
• Experience handling responsible disclosure and coordinating with external researchers and industry partners.
• Practical knowledge of secure coding guidelines, memory corruption mitigation, and common vulnerability classes (e.g., buffer overflows, SQLi, XSS, deserialization).
• Proven ability to script and automate tasks.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to clearly articulate technical risk to diverse audiences.
• Experience working in fast-paced environments with strict SLAs for vulnerability response.

Education

• BS or MS Degree in Engineering or Computer Science, related to computer security, application security, information security, network security, or cryptography.

Compensation Disclosure

The compensation offered for this position will depend on qualifications, experience, and work location. For candidates who receive an offer at the posted level, the starting base salary (for non-sales roles) or base salary + commission target (for sales/com-missioned roles) is expected to be the annual range listed below. The offered compensation may also include restricted stock units and a bonus. A description of our employee benefits may be found here.

$151,500.00 - $245,025.00/yr

Our Commitment

We're trailblazers that dream big, take risks, and challenge cybersecurity's status quo. It's simple: we can't accomplish our mission without diverse teams innovating, together.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations for all qualified individuals with a disability. If you require assistance or accommodation due to a disability or special need, please contact us at

Palo Alto Networks is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity in our workplace, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or other legally protected characteristics.

All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.

Is role eligible for Immigration Sponsorship?: Yes