Security engineer

Why choose between doing meaningful work and having a fulfilling life? At MITRE, you can have both. That's because MITRE people are committed to tackling our nation's toughest challenges—and we're committed to the long-term well-being of our employees. MITRE is different from most technology companies. We are a not-for-profit corporation chartered to work for the public interest, with no commercial conflicts to influence what we do. The R&D centers we operate for the government create lasting impact in fields as diverse as cybersecurity, healthcare, aviation, defense, and enterprise transformation. We're making a difference every day—working for a safer, healthier, and more secure nation and world. Our workplace reflects our values. We offer competitive benefits, exceptional professional development opportunities for career growth, and a culture of innovation that embraces adaptability, collaboration, technical excellence, and people in partnership. If this sounds like the choice you want to make, then choose MITRE - and make a difference with us.

MITRE’s Trustworthy & Secure AI (TSAI) Department consists of a diverse team united by a passion and a sense of urgency to harness trustworthy and assured artificial intelligence (AI) to help solve problems in the public interest. The TSAI Department supports our sponsors' missions by delivering capabilities for securing and increasing trust in AI-enabled systems, including data driven AI risk awareness and mitigation, AI red teaming, and trusted tools and techniques for applying AI in high consequence environments. The TSAI Department works across government, industry, and academia to provide, assess, and shape trustworthy and secure AI systems to address complex mission needs for our sponsors. Our work provides opportunities to address real-world challenges in the rapidly developing field of AI assurance, and to research and prototype new methods to address mission needs. We are looking for highly motivated, adaptive, and self-directed candidates to perform research, development, engineering, evaluation, and integration of secure AI systems.

Roles & Responsibilities:

The position involves assessing threats to AI systems, research and development of defenses and mitigations against adversarial AI tactics and techniques, and integrating AI solutions into government systems. Specific responsibilities will include:

• Perform AI adversarial threat analysis to identify and characterize vulnerabilities in real-world national security systems
• Work across military and intelligence community sponsors to understand shared needs and technologies
• Utilize and enhance MITRE ATLAS framework for assessing threats to AI-enabled systems
• Contribute to the innovation of new AI capabilities applied to cyber operational challenges
• Convey complex ideas to non-technical audiences through briefings and/or white papers

Basic Qualifications:

• Typically requires a Bachelor’s degree and a minimum of 2 years of artificial intelligence experience; or an advanced degree with relevant experience who can immediately contribute at this job step; or equivalent combination of AI-related education and work experience
• Advanced understanding of foundational AI/ML theory, with demonstrated ability to reason about AI system behavior, vulnerabilities, and evaluation
• Hands-on experience with one or more of the following technical areas: agentic AI, deep reinforcement learning, computer vision, generative AI
• Demonstrated advanced skills with Python and the standard AI technical stack
• Ability to work independently to learn new technologies, methods, processes, frameworks/platforms, and systems
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills to articulate challenging technical concepts to both lay and expert audiences
• Ability and willingness to obtain and maintain a DOD TS/SCI security clearance with CI poly within 12 months from the date of hire
• Per the U.S. Government’s eligibility requirements, you must be a U.S Citizen to be considered for a security clearance
• This position requires a minimum of 50% hybrid on-site

Preferred Qualifications:

• Advanced degree in computer science, engineering, or related disciplines
• Track record of successful deployment of AI/ML systems or components that have been used by customers or stakeholders outside of a lab/experimental setting
• Hands-on experience with one or more of the following AI security topics: AI red teaming, AI T&E, adversarial AI, AI-enhanced cybersecurity, AI strategy and governance
• Experience generating or analyzing intelligence reporting data
• Familiarity with MITRE ATLAS threat matrix
• Active IC or DOD TS/SCI security clearance with CI Poly

This requisition requires the candidate to have a minimum of the following clearance(s):

None

This requisition requires the hired candidate to have or obtain, within one year from the date of hire, the following clearance(s):

Top Secret/SCI/Polygraph

Salary compensation range and midpoint:

$121,600 - $152,000 - $182,400 Annual

Work Location Type:

Hybrid

Commitment to Non-Discrimination

All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to disability, status as a protected veteran or any other status protected by applicable federal, state, local or international law.

MITRE intends to maintain a website that is fully accessible to all individuals. If you are unable to search or apply for jobs and would like to request a reasonable accommodation for any part of MITRE’s employment process, please email [email protected] for general support and [email protected] for intern positions. This service is for individuals requiring reasonable accommodation requests. Please note that vendor solicitations will not receive a reply.

Benefits information may be found here.

Copyright © 1997-2026, The MITRE Corporation. All rights reserved. MITRE is a registered trademark of The MITRE Corporation. Material on this site may be copied and distributed with permission only.