Security Architect - Consultant

Role: Security Architect - Consultant

Location: Columbia, SC (Remote)

Duration: 12+ months

SCOPE: This position will serve as a SIEM engineer within the department of administration's division of information security. The successful candidate will show extensive experience successfully designing, implementing, maintaining and optimizing palo alto CORTEX XSIAM and CORTEX XDR in large-scale, multi-tenant security environments. This contractor will work with a large enterprise security team and a 24x7 security operations center (SOC), assisting full-time security architects, engineers and analysts with the design, implementation, integration and continuous improvement of SIEM, XDR, detection and response capabilities supporting multiple state agencies.

SUCCESSFUL CANDIDATE: This contractor will be primarily focused on CORTEX XSIAM and CORTEX XDR engineering, administration, detection content, automation and operational support while also providing important secondary support for CRIBL data modeling, log pipeline design, parsing, normalization, enrichment and ingestion. The role requires hands-on experience supporting both security engineering and SOC operations, including multi-tenant onboarding, tenant-specific configurations, access controls, data separation, integrations, dashboards, reporting, incident response, threat hunting, playbooks, runbooks, standard operating procedures and analyst enablement. The candidate must be able to support strategic planning, solution design, implementation, troubleshooting, performance optimization and continuous improvement of secure systems and services.

MANDATORY SCREENING REQUIREMENTS: These requirements are strictly enforced and non-negotiable. No exceptions can be granted. Candidates who cannot pass these requirements will not be eligible for hire. All applicants must successfully pass a full credit check and criminal background check during the initial hiring process. Once onboard, they must obtain and retain annual CJIS certification as part of the ongoing employment process.

OTHER: This position is 100% remote and will participate in a monthly on-call rotation supporting 24x7 SOC. After-hours maintenance, incident escalation support and operational handoffs may be required as needed.
DAILY DUTIES / RESPONSIBILITIES:

This position is 100% remote and will participate in a monthly on- call rotation supporting a 24x7 security operations center serving multiple state agencies. Other after-hours work may be required as needed.

Primarily assist in the planning, design, deployment, administration and operational support of enterprise SIEM and XDR capabilities, including: palo alto CORTEX XSIAM and CORTEX XDR platform engineering, configuration, optimization and troubleshooting multi-tenant agency onboarding, tenant-specific configuration, role-based access, data segregation, dashboards and reporting detection engineering, correlation rules, analytics, threat-hunting queries, watchlists, suppression logic and false-positive reduction.

Secondarily assist in the planning, design, deployment and operational support of log management and security data pipelines, including: CRIBL data modeling, log pipeline design, routing, parsing, normalization, enrichment, filtering, replay and ingestion onboarding and health monitoring of cloud, endpoint, network, identity, SAAS and custom application telemetry log volume, retention, performance and cost optimization while maintaining security and compliance requirements integrations with ticketing, case management, notification, identity, threat intelligence and other enterprise systems as needed.

Develop, test, deploy and maintain automated response workflows and playbooks for enrichment, triage, containment, escalation, notifications, case management and incident response.

Create and maintain operational runbooks, standard operating procedures, escalation matrices, troubleshooting guides, architecture diagrams, data-flow documentation, use-case catalogs and analyst knowledge articles.

Support tier 1 through tier 3 SOC analysts and incident responders through platform troubleshooting, detection tuning, threat hunting, technical escalation, knowledge transfer and shift handoffs.

Monitor and report on ingestion health, platform availability, alert volumes, detection coverage, false positives, service levels, mean time to detect, mean time to respond and tenant-specific operational metrics.

Ensure high availability, resilience, backup, recovery, lifecycle management and controlled change processes for SIEM, XDR and supporting log pipeline services.

Collaborate with security architects, engineers, analysts and agency stakeholders to align solutions with business goals, industry-standard frameworks, regulatory requirements and organizational risk tolerance.

REQUIRED SKILLS (RANK IN ORDER OF IMPORTANCE):

Hands-on PALO ALTO CORTEX XSIAM AND CORTEX XDR design, implementation, administration and operational support.

Experience in engineering and supporting SIEM capabilities for multi-tenant environments and 24x7 Security Operations Center operations.

Experience developing and tuning detections, correlation rules, analytics, threat-hunting queries, dashboards, reporting and alert suppression logic.

Strong experience creating and managing complex playbooks.

CRIBL data modeling, log pipeline design, parsing, normalization, enrichment, routing and ingestion.

Experience developing automation, integrations, playbooks and response workflows using scripting languages such as Python and Bash.

Experience onboarding and troubleshooting telemetry from cloud, endpoint, network, identity, SaaS, Linux, Windows and custom application sources.

Strong understanding of enterprise security architecture, incident response, networking, access control, secure system design and industry- standard cybersecurity frameworks.

PREFERRED SKILLS (RANK IN ORDER OF IMPORTANCE):

Hands-on experience operating CORTEX XSIAM AND CORTEX XDR in a large, multi-tenant environment.

Hands-on CRIBL administration, data modeling and log pipeline optimization experience.

Experience supporting Tier 1 through Tier 3 SOC analysts, threat hunting, incident response and 24x7 operational handoffs.

Familiarity with industry-standard security and compliance frameworks and experience developing playbooks, runbooks, procedures and technical documentation.

REQUIRED EDUCATION/CERTIFICATIONS:

Bachelor s degree in information technology or information security related field.

Eight years of relevant work experience may be substituted in lieu of education.

Five years of experience in supporting large IT environments and/or system deployments.

PREFERRED EDUCATION/CERTIFICATIONS:

CISSP, Security+ or GIAC certification.

Palo Alto Cortex, Cribl or other relevant SIEM/security platform certification.