Senior Security Engineer

Description:

Under general direction of the Data Systems Manager, performs complex professional and advisory functions, performing security administration and exercising substantial creativity and originality to reach the final objective. Researches, plans, installs, implements, configures, documents, maintains, communicates, coordinates in relationship to hardware, software, and operating systems of specified platforms. Develops complex and sophisticated integrations between systems and applications. Serves as designated lead worker. Maintains security focused solutions, both stand-alone and Software as a service (SaaS) within the Office of the Illinois Secretary of State by providing installation, configuration, training, diagnostic and administrative support for the effective utilization of these solutions. Provides setup, configuration and maintenance of both on-premises and cloud based security solutions.

Responsibilities:

• Designs, implements, and maintains security controls for cloud environments, including infrastructure, storage, networking, identity services, and platform services.  Supports the secure configuration and administration of cloud platforms. Partners with infrastructure and application teams to embed security requirements into cloud architecture deployment pipelines, and operational processes. Configures and monitors security solutions to detect and respond to cloud security alerts, suspicious activity, indicators of attack and indicators of misconfiguration. Conducts security assessment, technical reviews, and risk analysis for cloud services, architectures, and proposed changes.
• Leads the alignment of configuration management practices with applicable NIST frameworks and publications. Reviews system configurations to identify deviations from approved baselines, security standards, and organizational requirements. Monitors configuration changes to ensure they are properly requested, reviewed, approved, documented, tested, and implemented. Works with system owners, administrators, and security personnel to remediate non-compliant or unauthorized configurations.
• Establishes, maintains, and improves secure configuration standards for the agency’s information systems, endpoints, servers, network devices, cloud resources, and security tools. Ensures systems are configured in accordance with approved security baselines, policies, regulatory requirements, and best practices. Collaborates with IT teams to strengthen the agency’s security posture through effective configuration governance and technical control validation.
• Administers, monitors, and maintains the agency email security systems and controls. Coordinates with IT teams, security, and clients to ensure secure, reliable, and compliant email operations.

Experience: Minimum 5+ years of experience in IT security, cybersecurity engineering, security administration, 

Skills:

• Hands-on experience securing and administering cloud environments, networking, storage, infrastructure, and platform services.
• Experience establishing, reviewing, and maintaining secure configuration baselines for servers, endpoints, network devices, cloud resources, and security tools.
• Knowledge of NIST security frameworks and publications, including NIST SP 800-53 and configuration management controls.
• Experience monitoring security alerts, investigating suspicious activities, identifying security misconfigurations, and supporting remediation efforts.
• Ability to perform security configuration reviews, identify vulnerabilities and compliance gaps, assess risks, and recommend corrective actions.
• Experience reviewing system changes, validating security configurations, documenting exceptions, and ensuring compliance with security policies and standards.
• Experience administering and monitoring email security solutions, including anti-phishing, anti-spam, malware protection, and email security policies.
• Ability to document security standards, procedures, configuration changes, assessment findings, and remediation plans while coordinating with infrastructure, application, and security teams.