Cyber Defense Specialist

About the Job

You will join the Cyber Defense & Expertise Team within the Governance & Security Expertise area of the CISO organization at Allianz Technology. In this expert role, you help define, govern, and uplift the control environment across Detection & Response, Threat & Attack Surface Management, and DevSecOps. You bring a hacker mindset and offensive security experience to anticipate adversary tactics and translate them into practical, measurable controls and technical solutions.

Working closely with your peers, you will co-own control frameworks, propose technical approaches, and run proofs of concept (PoCs). Your work ensures our platforms and teams operate with robust, actionable, and auditable security practices aligned to CISO expectations.

This is almost a greenfield opportunity: you're defining security standards that will shape Allianz's technical security posture for years to come.

What You Do

• Co-develop and maintain a pragmatic control framework across Detection & Response, Threat & Attack Surface Management, and DevSecOps, ensuring clarity of ownership, metrics, and evidence.
• Define requirements and patterns for logging, SIEM/SOAR content, and security monitoring; curate detection use cases and response playbooks with SOC and product/platform teams.
• Support PoCs for new cyber defense capabilities (e.g., telemetry pipelines, EDR/EDX features, behavioral analytics, SOAR automations) and transition successful pilots into operational adoption.
• Drive threat and vulnerability management governance: co-define processes for scan scope, exception handling, remediation SLAs, and EOL/obsolescence controls for infrastructure and endpoints.
• Operationalize cyber threat intelligence: align ingestion, enrichment, and dissemination into detections, purple teaming, and risk treatment; track measurable outcomes.
• Embed DevSecOps controls into CI/CD: pipeline guardrails, dependency/secret management, SAST/DAST/IAST policies, artifact integrity, and build provenance; facilitate threat modeling and security-by-design.
• Partner with product owners and platform leads to design fit-for-purpose solutions, balancing standardization and local needs; provide clear technical guidance and blueprints.
• Support of establishment of meaningful KPIs/KRIs and evidence models; prepare governance reporting and review cadences with the CISO organization and stakeholders.
• Support incident readiness by maintaining cross-team playbooks, conducting tabletop exercises, and ensuring lessons learned close the loop into detections and controls.
• Contribute to audits and assessments by ensuring control definitions, artifacts, and execution evidence are complete and consistent.

What You Bring

• 8+ years in information technology from which 4+ years in information security, with at least 3 years in hands-on technical security roles.
• Offensive security mindset with hands-on experience in red/purple team activities, exploit development, or similar attack-focused work, complemented by practical blue-team exposure.
• Strong technical depth in logging/telemetry, SIEM/SOAR, EDR/endpoint management, and incident response workflows, including detection content lifecycle.
• Proven experience in vulnerability management governance (scope, prioritization, remediation SLAs) and end-of-life/obsolescence control of platforms and endpoints.
• Practical DevSecOps experience: securing CI/CD pipelines, dependency and secret management, and using SAST/DAST/IAST; facilitation of threat modeling and secure coding practices.
• Experience building security metrics, KPI/KRI frameworks, or control validation frameworks
• Ability to design and run PoCs, produce clear solution proposals and decision papers, and guide transitions from pilot to steady-state operations.
• Strong stakeholder management and communication skills; ability to translate adversary techniques and technical concepts into actionable, auditable controls.
• Hands-on security certifications such as OSCP, GPEN, GIAC, or equivalent demonstrating practical technical competency (not just exam knowledge).
• Enterprise security architecture: Experience working across multiple business units, geographies, or operating entities.
• EU regulatory context: Familiarity with DORA, NIS2, CRA, GDPR, or similar frameworks that shape Allianz's security posture.
• Practical AI experience and ability to use AI in daily work.
• Preferably, threat intelligence operations or threat modeling background.

What We Offer

• We offer a hybrid work model which recognizes the value of striking a balance between in-person collaboration and remote working incl. up to 25 days per year working from abroad.
• We believe in rewarding performance and our compensation and benefits package includes a company bonus scheme, pension, employee shares program and multiple employee discounts (details vary by location).
• From career development and digital learning programs to international career mobility, we offer lifelong learning for our employees worldwide and an environment where innovation, delivery and empowerment are fostered.
• Flexible working, health and wellbeing offers (including healthcare and parental leave benefits) support to balance family and career and help our people return from career breaks with experience that nothing else can teach. Access to over 10,000 on-demand learning resources and programs, to support you in taking control of your career development.
• Access to the AYMC Sportpass with the opportunity to engage in various sports and fitness activities.
• Parking support, ensuring a seamless and stress-free commuting experience to and from the workplace.

About Allianz Technology

With its headquarters in Munich, Germany, Allianz Technology is Allianz's global IT service provider and delivers IT solutions that drive the group's digitalization. With more than 11,000 employees in over 20 countries around the world, Allianz Technology is tasked with running, optimizing, transforming, and innovating the infrastructure, applications, and services together with Allianz companies to co-create the best customer experience. We service the entire spectrum of digitalization – from one of the industry's largest IT infrastructure projects that spans data centres, networks, and security, to application platforms ranging from workplace services to digital interaction. In short: We deliver comprehensive end-to-end IT solutions for Allianz in the digital age. We are the backbone of Allianz.

D&I Statement

Allianz Technology is proud to be an equal opportunity employer dedicated to fostering an inclusive work environment for everyone. We embrace individuals of all gender identities and expressions, sexual orientations, ethnicities, ages, nationalities, religions, disabilities, and philosophies of life. Ultimately, our greatest strength as a company lies in the unique skills, experiences, and backgrounds our employees contribute.