Response Engineer

About Us

At Cloudflare, we are on a mission to help build a better Internet. Today the company runs one of the world’s largest networks that powers millions of websites and other Internet properties for customers ranging from individual bloggers to SMBs to Fortune 500 companies. Cloudflare protects and accelerates any Internet application online without adding hardware, installing software, or changing a line of code. Internet properties powered by Cloudflare all have web traffic routed through its intelligent global network, which gets smarter with every request. As a result, they see significant improvement in performance and a decrease in spam and other attacks. Cloudflare was named to Entrepreneur Magazine’s Top Company Cultures list and ranked among the World’s Most Innovative Companies by Fast Company. 

At Cloudflare, we’re not looking for people who wait for a polished roadmap; we’re looking for the builders who see the cracks in the Internet that everyone else has simply learned to live with. We value candidates who have the instinct to spot a "normalized" problem and the AI-native curiosity to create a solution using the latest tools. Our culture is built on iteration, leveraging AI to ship faster today to make it better tomorrow, while ensuring that every improvement, no matter how small, is shared across the team to lift everyone up. If you’re the type of person who values curiosity over bureaucracy, and that AI is a partner in solving tough problems to keep the Internet moving forward, you’ll fit right in.

Location: Austin, TX 

About the Department

Cloudforce One is Cloudflare's threat operations and research team, responsible for identifying and disrupting cyber threats ranging from sophisticated cyber criminal activity to nation-state sponsored advanced persistent threats (APTs). Cloudforce One works in close partnership with external organizations and internal Cloudflare teams, continuously developing operational tradecraft and expanding ever-growing sources of threat intelligence to enable expedited threat hunting and remediation.

Members of Cloudforce One are at the helm of leveraging an incredibly vast and varied set of data points that only one of the world's largest global networks can provide. The team analyzes these unique data points at massive scale and efficiency, synthesizing findings into actionable threat intelligence to better protect our customers.

About INTERDICT

I.N.T.E.R.D.I.C.T. (Identify, Neutralize, Triage, Engage, Respond, Disrupt, Integrate, Contain, Threat Hunting) is Cloudforce One's unified operational security organization responsible for identifying, analyzing, and responding to threats targeting Cloudflare and its customers. INTERDICT encompasses three main sub-functions:

• PhishGuard: Managed email threat detection and response service
• Cloudflare Managed Defense (CMD): Network and application security monitoring for 'Under Attack' mitigation support.
• Detection Engineering: ML model development and detection optimization

Together, INTERDICT provides comprehensive 24×7×365 protection across email, application, and network threat surfaces.

Role Summary

As a Response Engineer for PhishGuard, you will serve as the essential human intelligence layer responsible for identifying, tracking, and defeating sophisticated email-borne cyber threats like Business Email Compromise (BEC) and vendor fraud. You will operate within the INTERDICT organization, collaborating closely with internal teams like Detection Engineering, PREDICT (Threat Intelligence), and SIRT to hunt down adversaries and refine global security models. Our ideal candidate possesses deep forensic thoroughness, exceptional nuance detection, and a growth-minded curiosity to protect global organizations using one of the world's largest networks.

Role Responsibilities

• Conduct continuous, real-time monitoring of email threat queues to review and analyze sophisticated attacks flagged by Cloudflare Email Security automated systems.
• Investigate customer-reported submissions, execute proactive threat hunts targeting emerging patterns, and perform manual retraction or quarantine of verified malicious emails.
• Provide critical feedback to Detection Engineering to update machine learning models and contribute novel campaign data to global intelligence repositories.
• Identify nuanced threat patterns by correlating technical telemetry with behavioral indicators, generating detailed threat dossiers for impending organizational risks.
• Deliver direct crisis intervention and proactive phone notifications to customers regarding high-dollar BEC threats and active insider risks.
• Lead technical onboarding sessions for new customers, configuring internal system instances with bespoke detection rules, thresholds, and custom allow/block lists.
• Guide customers through their multi-year DMARC implementation journey toward strict "Reject" policy enforcement by conducting SPF and DKIM alignment audits.

Role Requirements (Must-Have Skills)

• Undergraduate degree in Computer Science, Information Security, Information Systems, or equivalent practical experience.
• 5+ years of experience tracking and analyzing complex cyber campaigns utilizing technical indicators such as Domains, IP Addresses, and email headers.
• Proven expertise analyzing, investigating, and defending against highly targeted phishing, invoice fraud, and Business Email Compromise (BEC) attacks.
• Deep working knowledge of core email authentication protocols (SPF, DKIM, DMARC) and aggregate/forensic data interpretation.
• Hands-on experience utilizing AI LLM tools (such as OpenCode or Windsurf) to develop automations for daily analysis and productivity workflows.
• Excellent verbal and written English communication skills, with a strong ability to translate complex technical threats into actionable business intelligence for executive stakeholders.

Nice-to-Have Skills

• Relevant industry certifications such as GCIH, GCIA, CEH, Security+, or equivalent.
• Technical familiarity with regular expressions, YARA rules, SQL query formulation, and malicious file format analysis (e.g., Microsoft Office Documents, Adobe PDFs).
• Prior experience working within managed security services (MSSP) or customer-facing security consulting environments.
• Familiarity with the broader Cloudflare ecosystem, including Cloudflare Email Security, WAF, and Zero Trust architectures.

What Makes Cloudflare Special?

We’re not just a highly ambitious, large-scale technology company. We’re a highly ambitious, large-scale technology company with a soul. Fundamental to our mission to help build a better Internet is protecting the free and open Internet.

Project Galileo: Since 2014, we've equipped more than 2,400 journalism and civil society organizations in 111 countries with powerful tools to defend themselves against attacks that would otherwise censor their work, technology already used by Cloudflare’s enterprise customers--at no cost.

Athenian Project: In 2017, we created the Athenian Project to ensure that state and local governments have the highest level of protection and reliability for free, so that their constituents have access to election information and voter registration. Since the project, we've provided services to more than 425 local government election websites in 33 states.

1.1.1.1: We released 1.1.1.1 to help fix the foundation of the Internet by building a faster, more secure and privacy-centric public DNS resolver. This is available publicly for everyone to use - it is the first consumer-focused service Cloudflare has ever released. Here’s the deal - we don’t store client IP addresses never, ever. We will continue to abide by our privacy commitment and ensure that no user data is sold to advertisers or used to target consumers.

Sound like something you’d like to be a part of? We’d love to hear from you!

Please note that applicants who progress to the offer stage of the interview process may be asked to attend an in-person interview within one of the Cloudflare Offices or Cloudflare Hubs.  More details about this will be available at that stage of the interview process.

This position may require access to information protected under U.S. export control laws, including the U.S. Export Administration Regulations. Please note that any offer of employment may be conditioned on your authorization to receive software or technology controlled under these U.S. export laws without sponsorship for an export license.

Cloudflare is proud to be an equal opportunity employer.  We are committed to providing equal employment opportunity for all people and place great value in both diversity and inclusiveness.  All qualified applicants will be considered for employment without regard to their, or any other person's, perceived or actual race, color, religion, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, age, physical or mental disability, medical condition, family care status, or any other basis protected by law. We are an AA/Veterans/Disabled Employer.

Cloudflare provides reasonable accommodations to qualified individuals with disabilities.  Please tell us if you require a reasonable accommodation to apply for a job. Examples of reasonable accommodations include, but are not limited to, changing the application process, providing documents in an alternate format, using a sign language interpreter, or using specialized equipment.  If you require a reasonable accommodation to apply for a job, please contact us via e-mail at hr@cloudflare.com or via mail at 101 Townsend St. San Francisco, CA 94107.