Job Title: Lead Software Engineer – WAF, API Security & AWS Application Migration
Location: Alpharetta, Georgia, USA
Duration: W2 Contract
Job Summary
We are seeking an experienced Lead Software Engineer specializing in Web Application Firewall (WAF), API Security, and AWS Application Migration to support enterprise-scale application onboarding and security transformation initiatives. The ideal candidate will have hands-on experience with Akamai WAF, security policy tuning, application migration, threat analysis, and incident response.
The role involves collaborating with application, network, DNS, load balancer, firewall, proxy, and QA teams to onboard internet-facing applications onto Akamai WAF, optimize security policies, and transition applications from monitoring to enforcement mode. Experience with AI/LLM security, API protection, and financial services environments will be an added advantage.
Key Responsibilities
1. WAF Onboarding & Application Migration
- Lead the onboarding of internet-facing applications onto Akamai WAF.
- Coordinate application migration activities with DNS, load balancer, proxy, firewall, and QA teams.
- Manage WAF policy deployment through monitoring/alert mode to deny/block mode.
- Plan and execute testing, traffic cutovers, validation, rollout, and rollback procedures.
- Support enterprise-scale application migration initiatives while minimizing business disruption.
2. WAF Policy Tuning & False Positive Analysis
- Analyze production traffic and WAF security events to identify false positives.
- Tune WAF policies to maintain strong security while minimizing legitimate traffic disruptions.
- Investigate blocked requests and application behavior to determine root causes.
- Develop narrowly scoped policy exceptions based on application requirements and risk assessments.
3. API Security & AI/LLM Security
- Troubleshoot AI- and LLM-related traffic triggering WAF protections, including SQL injection controls.
- Collaborate with application teams and vendors to implement compensating controls, header-based attestation mechanisms, and API-specific security protections.
- Evaluate emerging Akamai AI security capabilities, including Firewall for AI, AI-powered threat detection, bot identification, and agentic AI protections.
- Support secure API design and protection against web application and API-based threats.
4. Security Event Monitoring & Threat Analysis
- Monitor and analyze Akamai WAF, Bot Manager, DDoS, Client Reputation, and API Security events.
- Investigate attack patterns and distinguish malicious traffic from legitimate application activity.
- Recommend security policy improvements and appropriate threat mitigation measures.
- Support incident response activities and security investigations.
5. Security Reviews & Platform Upgrades
- Conduct quarterly security reviews of applications protected by Akamai.
- Assess opportunities to transition applications from monitoring mode to active mitigation mode.
- Perform quarterly WAF platform upgrades, policy reviews, and security-control tuning.
- Ensure security configurations remain aligned with evolving threats and application requirements.
6. Incident Response & Troubleshooting
- Investigate production incidents and application behavior changes following WAF enablement.
- Troubleshoot latency issues, traffic-routing problems, load balancer interactions, client IP handling, surge queue events, and application outages.
- Coordinate with Akamai engineering and internal technology teams to identify root causes and implement corrective actions.
- Support incident resolution while maintaining application availability and security.
7. Security Architecture & Consulting
- Advise application teams on secure web architecture, OWASP protections, API security, bot mitigation, client reputation controls, and DDoS protection.
- Provide technical guidance on WAF implementation, migration strategies, and security policy design.
- Collaborate with cross-functional teams to improve application security and operational resilience.
Required Skills & Experience
- 7–10+ years of experience in software engineering, application security, network security, or related technical roles.
- Strong hands-on experience with Akamai WAF onboarding, configuration, and policy tuning.
- Experience migrating internet-facing applications and managing WAF enforcement transitions.
- Strong understanding of API security, OWASP protections, and web application threats.
- Experience analyzing WAF events, investigating false positives, and tuning security policies.
- Knowledge of DNS, load balancers, proxies, firewalls, traffic routing, and client IP handling.
- Experience with security monitoring, incident response, troubleshooting, and root cause analysis.
- Understanding of DDoS protection, bot mitigation, and client reputation controls.
- Experience working with application, network, infrastructure, and QA teams in enterprise environments.
Preferred Qualifications
- Experience with AI/LLM security, including protection of AI-powered applications and LLM traffic.
- Familiarity with Akamai Firewall for AI, AI-powered detections, and agentic AI security.
- Experience with enterprise-scale application migration projects.
- Experience in financial services or banking environments.
- Familiarity with AWS application migration and cloud security.
- Experience supporting production security incidents and coordinating with vendor engineering teams.
Ideal Candidate Profile
The ideal candidate is a hands-on security engineering professional with strong Akamai WAF expertise, practical application migration experience, and a solid understanding of API and web application security. The candidate should be comfortable working across application and infrastructure teams, troubleshooting complex production issues, tuning security policies, and implementing security controls without impacting business-critical applications.
