Backend Security Engineer — AI Coding Evaluation
About the Role
A structured AI initiative focused on improving software engineering systems through realistic coding challenges, security-oriented tasks, and deterministic evaluation. The work combines backend engineering with application security, debugging, code analysis, and performance optimization.
This opportunity is ideal for experienced backend engineers with practical cybersecurity or security engineering experience. Strong programming fundamentals and expertise in languages such as Python, Java, Rust, TypeScript, C++, or comparable technologies are central to the work; prior AI experience is not required.
The work involves creating challenging coding tasks, implementing reliable verifiers, identifying vulnerabilities, reviewing code, fixing defects, and evaluating implementation quality. Careful reasoning about security, correctness, edge cases, and system performance is critical.
What You'll Do
- Create realistic and challenging backend coding tasks for AI systems
- Develop deterministic verifiers that distinguish valid implementations from incorrect solutions
- Implement and evaluate backend features and bug fixes
- Perform security-focused code reviews and identify potential vulnerabilities
- Conduct penetration testing and vulnerability assessment where applicable
- Debug software defects and determine underlying causes
- Refactor existing codebases to improve security, maintainability, and reliability
- Analyze and optimize application and service performance
- Evaluate implementations against security, correctness, testing, and quality requirements
Requirements
- Strong backend development experience with Java, Node.js, Go, Rust, TypeScript, Python, C++, or comparable languages
- Experience building scalable services and APIs
- Practical experience with application security, security audits, penetration testing, or vulnerability assessment
- Strong debugging, automated testing, and performance optimization skills
- Ability to identify security weaknesses and reason about potential attack surfaces
- Experience reviewing and refactoring production codebases
- Strong understanding of algorithms, data structures, and foundational computer science concepts
- Sound code review and technical judgment skills
- Ability to work independently in a structured remote environment
- Availability for approximately 15 hours per week with flexible scheduling
- Ability to complete technical assessments and project work independently without outside assistance
- Preferred: familiarity with OWASP, CWE, secure coding practices, or security-focused development workflows
- Preferred: experience identifying software bottlenecks and resolving complex technical defects
- Preferred: strong analytical, problem-solving, and technical communication skills