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Engineering & Architecture 1d ago

Cybersecurity Red Teamer

Handshake
United StatesUnited States
Part-time
Not Disclosed
Senior-Level

Job Description

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About the Role

As a Cybersecurity Red Teamer, you will evaluate whether AI models can be manipulated into generating functional malware, viable exploit code, attack tooling, or step-by-step operational guidance that could assist threat actors in carrying out cyberattacks.

Your job is to identify gaps between what a model’s safety guardrails are intended to block and what a skilled adversary can extract.

This role requires you to think like an attacker with access to a highly capable AI assistant. You will craft adversarial prompts and multi-turn interaction chains that simulate how real threat actors—ranging from inexperienced attackers to advanced persistent threat operators—might use LLMs to accelerate reconnaissance, weaponization, exploitation, lateral movement, persistence, and exfiltration.

You will then evaluate whether the model’s output is genuinely dangerous or merely surface-level noise.

Deep cybersecurity expertise is essential. Your value will come from examining a model-generated payload, exploit chain, or attack plan and determining whether it would actually work, how much refinement it would require, and what type of attacker it could meaningfully assist.

This position may be performed from our Seattle location or remotely within the United States. Seattle-based and remote team members will collaborate closely through shared evaluation workflows, regular feedback, and virtual working sessions.

What You Will Do

  • Design technically grounded adversarial prompts that test whether models provide meaningful assistance across the cyber kill chain, from reconnaissance through exfiltration and impact.

  • Evaluate model-generated code and technical output for functional correctness, determining whether outputs represent real exploits, plausible attack tooling, or nonfunctional noise.

  • Test model behavior across offensive categories, including malware generation, vulnerability exploitation, social engineering, credential harvesting, privilege escalation, command-and-control infrastructure, and data exfiltration.

  • Probe dual-use boundaries by testing how models respond to queries that combine legitimate security research, penetration testing, and defensive operations with offensive applications.

  • Simulate attacker personas at varying skill levels, including opportunistic, intermediate, and advanced or APT-level actors.

  • Test multi-step and multi-turn attack chains, including scenarios in which early turns establish benign context before pivoting to malicious requests.

  • Score model responses using structured harm taxonomies and severity rubrics calibrated to real-world exploitability.

  • Document findings with clear technical reasoning, including what a response gets right, what it gets wrong, and what level of attacker it could realistically assist.

  • Contribute to the development and refinement of cybersecurity-specific evaluation frameworks and threat models.

  • Collaborate with red teamers, AI researchers, and policy teams to translate findings into actionable model improvements.

  • Stay current on evolving tactics, techniques, and procedures, CVEs, jailbreak techniques, and the intersection of AI and offensive security.

Core Qualifications

  • Professional experience in offensive security, penetration testing, red teaming, vulnerability research, malware analysis, threat intelligence, or incident response.

  • Ability to read, write, and evaluate code in languages commonly used for offensive tooling, such as Python, PowerShell, Bash, C/C++, or JavaScript.

  • Understanding of common attack frameworks, techniques, and procedures, including MITRE ATT&CK and OWASP.

  • Ability to assess the functional correctness and real-world exploitability of model-generated technical output.

  • Strong hands-on experience using multiple LLMs, such as ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or open-source models.

  • Creative and adversarial problem-solving skills.

  • Clear and precise written communication, including the ability to explain technical risk to nonspecialist audiences.

  • Strong ethical judgment and the ability to separate adversarial thinking from personal values.

  • Ability to work independently while collaborating effectively in a feedback-heavy, distributed environment.

Nice to Have

  • Relevant certifications, such as OSCP, OSCE, GPEN, GXPN, CRTO, CRTL, CEH, or similar.

  • Active or previous security clearance.

  • Experience with exploit development, reverse engineering, or binary analysis.

  • Background in cloud security, container security, or infrastructure-as-code attack surfaces.

  • Familiarity with AI and machine-learning attack surfaces, including prompt injection, model extraction, training-data poisoning, and adversarial examples.

  • Experience building or operating command-and-control frameworks, custom implants, or offensive tooling.

  • A bug-bounty track record or published CVEs.

  • Previous work in trust and safety, content moderation, or AI evaluation.

  • Familiarity with LLM APIs or evaluation tooling.

You May Be a Strong Fit If

  • You have spent years breaking into systems and want to apply that mindset to testing AI models.

  • You can examine a model-generated reverse shell, phishing template, or privilege-escalation script and quickly determine whether it would work in a real environment.

  • You think in kill chains and attack graphs, not just individual prompts.

  • You understand that the difference between a useful coding assistant and a dangerous one often comes down to context, specificity, and operational detail.

  • You closely follow the offensive-security community and stay current when new techniques emerge.

  • You care about AI safety because you understand what can happen when powerful tools are used irresponsibly.

  • You can collaborate effectively with a team whether you are working from Seattle or remotely.

Content Notice

This role involves regular and deliberate engagement with offensive cybersecurity content. You will create and evaluate scenarios involving malware, exploit code, social engineering, network-intrusion techniques, and other attack methodologies.

All work is conducted within a structured evaluation framework with strict ethical guidelines. Candidates must be able to engage with this material professionally, responsibly, and sustainably.

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Handshake is the premier early talent network and university recruiting platform dedicated to democratizing career opportunities for students and recent graduates. Founded in 2014 by Garrett Lord, Ben Christensen, and Scott Ringwelski in San Francisco, the company was built on the belief that a student's career prospects should not be dictated by their zip code or the prestige of their university. Under the hood, Handshake operates a massive three-sided marketplace connecting over 1,400 higher education institutions, millions of active students, and nearly a million employers—ranging from Fortune 500 giants to local non-profits. The platform provides a centralized hub for job postings, virtual career fairs, and proactive talent sourcing, leveraging smart matching algorithms to surface relevant roles based on a student's skills and interests rather than just their pedigree. Their primary target audience includes college students entering the workforce, university career centers seeking to boost graduate outcomes, and enterprise talent acquisition teams desperate to build diverse, entry-level pipelines. What sets Handshake apart in the HR Tech space is its absolute dominance in the higher education ecosystem, effectively replacing legacy university job boards and becoming the undisputed standard for early-career recruitment.

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