Network Security Operations Engineer

Pension Insurance Corporation (“PIC”) provides secure retirement incomes through comprehensive risk management and excellence in asset and liability management, as well as exceptional customer service. Our purpose is to pay the pensions of our current and future policyholders. We achieve our purpose by setting Companywide strategic objectives and driving a healthy culture based on our PIC Values of Resilient, Adaptable, and Loyal.

This role sits within the IT Department, reporting to the Principal Security Operations Engineer and working closely with all teams within IT and PIC to ensure the confidentiality, integrity and availability of PIC systems, networks, and information assets.

Support the Security Operations Team to design, build and continuously improve the security controls that ensure confidentiality, integrity and availability of PIC’s systems, networks, and information assets.

Support the Security Operations team and other members of the IT team to continuously assess the PIC environment and ensure that exposure to threats and prevalence of vulnerabilities remains within PIC tolerance levels.

Work with the SOC, NOC, and internal IT teams to ensure proactive monitoring, investigation, and response to potential security incidents.

Specific accountabilities assigned to the role of Network Security Operations Engineer within IT Production Services:

• Oversee the security of the physical and cloud network infrastructure. and ensure best practice configurations are applied.
• Assist with the secure design of the firewalls and their configuration, including regular reviews of the active ruleset.
• Ensuring the firmware of all network devices (e.g. switches, firewalls and routers) is maintained effectively.
• Research and suggest improvements to the network security posture with respect to incident detection and response.
• Identify, assess and mitigate cybersecurity threats across the PIC environment;
• Support the vulnerability management programme, ensuring effective communications and a proactive approach to assessment and remediation;
• Support the penetration testing programme, including scoping, risk assessments, remediation planning and reporting;
• Maintain strong identity and access management controls, ensuring a consistent approach to roles, permissions and the principle of least privilege;
• Ensure broad coverage of security and monitoring data into the SIEM;
• Align security controls and make improvements to PIC policies, standards and guidelines;
• Assist with the development of processes and procedures to improve incident response times;
• Ensure strong DLP controls, and minimise the risks related to malicious and non-malicious data exfiltration;
• Work with the Cyber Security Operations Centre (CSOC) to ensure detection, investigation, response and recovery of security related events;
• Where necessary participate in out of hours support of security incident management;
• Identify new and emerging technologies, and understand the impact these have on the threat landscape and PIC’s ability to respond to changing circumstances;
• Contribute to Security Awareness training programmes;

Requirements

Knowledge

• Great awareness of cybersecurity trends and hacking techniques;
• Demonstrable experience in Cybersecurity field;
• Experience with Windows and Linux operating systems;
• Understanding of operating systems and application security hardening;
• Experience with penetration testing, vulnerability scanning and intrusion detection;
• Understanding of IaaS, PaaS and SaaS;
• Understanding of Security Information and Event management (SIEM) solutions;
• Understanding of Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) solutions;
• Understanding of Data Loss Prevention (DLP) techniques;
• Experience with configuration and maintaining of endpoint protection technologies, including anti-malware and application whitelisting;
• Knowledge of encryption technologies and standards;
• Experience with cloud services, Microsoft Azure being beneficial.

Skills

• Organised and motivated self-starter, with the ability to prioritise and manage a busy workload;
• Ability to remain methodical and unflustered in high pressure scenarios;
• Adaptable, able to work independently in a fast-paced environment with changing priorities;
• Enthusiastic and willing to learn new skills and take on new work;

Experience

• Three or more years security or systems engineering experience
• Experience in researching, deploying, and supporting information security systems
• Experience deploying and managing vulnerability assessment software to identify and report on enterprise vulnerabilities and configuration risks
• Experience in coaching and mentoring junior team members

Benefits

In addition to a competitive base salary and the opportunity to participate in our annual, performance-related bonus plan, upon joining us here at Pension Insurance Corporation, you will get access to some great benefits, including private medical insurance, 28 days' annual leave (excluding bank holidays), a generous pension scheme and much more.