Principal Software Engineer (CDSS Advanced URL Filtering)

Company Description

At Palo Alto Networks® everything starts and ends with our mission: protecting our way of life in the digital age by preventing successful cyberattacks. It’s not a small goal. It isn’t simple either, but we aren’t in this for the easy answer. As a company with a foundation in challenging the way things are done, we’re looking for innovators with a dedication to best. In return, your career will have a tangible impact – one that's working towards technology that affects every level of society.

Our mission doesn’t happen by treading softly – no, it happens by defining an industry. It means building products that haven't been thought of. It means selling products with a solutions mindset. It means supporting the infrastructure of a company that moves at an incredible speed – intentionally – to stay ahead of the world’s next cyberthreat.

Job Description

Your Career

As a member of the Advanced URL Filtering (Internet Security) Infrastructure and Data Science Team, you will work closely with data scientists, security researchers, and other engineers on implementing different projects to detect and defend against various emerging threats in the areas of Web Security. You will build big data and distributed systems that use machine learning and deep learning models to analyze and categorize an enormous amount of URLs. You will be a key person in transforming ideas into products which are part of the next generation security platform. The Internet Security Research Team is responsible for innovating new security techniques.

This role is located at our dynamic Santa Clara California headquarters campus.

Your Impact

• Design, build, and maintain scalable and reliable threat research systems to support both customer-facing products and internal infrastructure.

• Collaborate with cross-functional teams, including Product Managers, researchers, and engineers, to gather requirements, create design drafts, and develop detailed functional specifications.

• Develop and implement solutions that adhere to software development and security best practices.

• Partner with SREs to ensure seamless production releases, deployments, and continuous monitoring for system reliability and performance.

Qualifications

• Creative thinker and collaborative team player with strong communication skills and a drive to make a meaningful impact.

• Programming languages: proficiency in Golang, Python, Java, or Scala.

• Cloud and Containers: Strong expertise in cloud platforms (GCP, AWS, Azure), including event-driven architecture with Pub/Sub, and container-based development using Docker and Kubernetes.

• Databases: Proficiency in SQL and NoSQL databases, including MySQL, BigQuery, MongoDB, Cloud SQL, Firestore, and Bigtable.

• System Design and Development: Strong ability to design and build scalable backend systems, data pipelines, and RESTful APIs or gRPC services.

• Testing and Deployment: Skilled in writing unit, integration, and system tests, conducting integration and regression testing, and managing production deployments.

• DevOp Practices: Hands-on experience with CI/CD pipelines and proficiency in Linux OS and shell scripting.

• Big Data and Distributed Systems: Experience with Big data technologies, distributed systems, and ETL pipelines like Spark.

• Machine Learning Knowledge: Basic knowledge of Machine Learning and Web Content Classification.

• Front-End Skills: Experience with front-end development and Javascript is a plus.

• Professional Attributes: Hands-on and humble attitude with a self-directed mindset and a passion for cybersecurity.

• Education and Experience: BS/MS Majored in Computer Science or Computer Engineering with 5+ years of industrial experience.

Additional Information

The Team

We define the industry, instead of waiting for directions. We need individuals who feel comfortable in ambiguity of creating on new frontiers, excited by the prospect of a challenge, and empowered by the unknown risks facing our everyday lives that are only enabled by a secure digital environment. 

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/commissioned roles) is expected to be between:  $179000 - $210,500//yr. The offered compensation may also include restricted stock units and a bonus. A description of our employee benefits may be found here.

Our Commitme