Junior Application Security Specialist

Triage Security Findings - Assess incoming bug bounty reports and scanner findings. Evaluate validity, calculate real severity, and escalate appropriately with clear written summaries.

Assist with Vulnerability Assessments - Participate in security assessments of web applications and APIs. Help identify and document risks in new features and existing systems.

Write Clear Security Documentation - Document findings, reproduction steps, and remediation guidance in a way that engineering teams can act on.

Support Threat Modeling - Participate in threat modeling sessions. Learn to identify trust boundaries, data flows, and attack surfaces in system designs.

Monitor Security Tools - Help operate SAST, DAST, and dependency scanning tooling. Track findings, reduce noise, and support remediation workflows.

Support Code Reviews - Review code for common vulnerability classes under guidance of senior specialists. Learn to identify security issues across PHP, Python, and Go codebases.

Stay Current - Follow developments in the security community. Bring awareness of new vulnerability classes, CVEs, and attack techniques relevant to our stack.

Web Security Fundamentals - Solid understanding of common vulnerability classes: OWASP Top 10, CSRF, XSS, IDOR, SQL injection, open redirect, authentication and session management weaknesses. You understand root causes, not just names.

Web and Browser Fundamentals - Solid understanding of how web applications work: HTTP request/response cycle, client-server model, REST APIs, how browsers handle same-origin policy, cookies and their attributes, and CORS. This is the foundation everything else builds on.

Security Testing Tools - Hands-on experience with Burp Suite or similar web application security testing tools. You have used them to intercept, modify, and replay requests — not just run automated scans.

Vulnerability Documentation - Able to reproduce a vulnerability and write it up clearly: reproduction steps, proof of concept, and impact statement. Findings that engineering teams cannot reproduce or understand do not get fixed.

Secure Development Awareness - Familiarity with foundational secure coding concepts: input validation, output encoding, parameterized queries, and least privilege.

Code Readability - Ability to read and follow code in at least one language relevant to web security - PHP, Python, JavaScript, or Go. You don't need to be a developer, but you need to follow logic and spot security-relevant patterns.

Analytical Thinking - You reason through problems methodically. You can explain not just what a vulnerability is but why it exists, how it is exploited, and what fixing it actually requires.

Clear Written Communication - You write findings and summaries that are precise, reproducible, and useful to the engineers who need to act on them.

Curiosity and Initiative - You dig into problems rather than stopping at the surface. When something looks wrong, you investigate before concluding

Participation in bug bounty programs or CTF competitions;

Basic scripting ability for automation - Python or Bash;

Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines and where security tooling fits;

Exposure to cloud environments - GCP, AWS, or Azure;

Relevant coursework or certifications - eWPT, CEH, PortSwigger Web Security Academy progress, or similar entry-level credentials.