Security & Compliance Topics
Governance, compliance frameworks, regulatory requirements, compliance implementation, and compliance-driven risk management. Covers compliance frameworks (SOX, GDPR, HIPAA, FCPA, etc.), regulatory interpretation, compliance control design, audit and control effectiveness evaluation, and compliance process management. For operational security implementation and technical threat mitigation, see Security Engineering & Operations.
Regulatory Frameworks and Standards
Thorough knowledge of the major regulatory, privacy, and security frameworks and standards that organizations use to define controls and demonstrate conformance. Candidates should be able to explain the purpose, scope, and typical control categories of frameworks such as the National Institute of Standards and Technology cybersecurity framework and related publications, International Organization for Standardization 27001 for information security management and International Organization for Standardization 27701 for privacy management, Service Organization Controls type two, the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, the General Data Protection Regulation, the California Consumer Privacy Act and the California Privacy Rights Act, the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program, Control Objectives for Information and Related Technologies, and the Center for Internet Security critical controls. Interviewers may probe the difference between mandatory regulation and voluntary standards, prescriptive versus principles based approaches, how frameworks map to business risk drivers, how to map controls across multiple frameworks, and how audit assessment and certification processes operate in practice. Candidates should also be able to describe common gaps, typical remediation strategies, and how to build evidence and documentation to support audits and assessments.
Organizational Security Challenges and Strategy
Evaluate and articulate the security risks, maturity, and strategic priorities an organization faces, and explain how the security function and this role would address them. Topics include threat landscape assessment, security program maturity, incident response and penetration testing roles, executive alignment and resourcing, trade offs between usability and security, compliance and regulatory implications, risk prioritization, and practical mitigation approaches tailored to the organization size and business model. Interviewers look for evidence of company-specific research, an understanding of how security integrates with product and engineering teams, and actionable recommendations for near term and longer term improvements.
Security Culture and Awareness
Covers strategies and practice for creating and sustaining a security minded organization where security is a shared responsibility. Topics include designing and running awareness programs and campaigns, embedding secure practices into the software development life cycle and daily workflows, translating policies into observable behaviors, and fostering psychological safety so people raise concerns and report issues. Includes practical initiatives such as role based training, phishing simulations, tabletop exercises, onboarding flows, manager and executive engagement, incentives and recognition programs, and tooling or process changes that make secure choices easier. Also covers measurement and evaluation approaches such as baseline and follow up surveys, behavior and compliance metrics, incident trends, adoption rates, training completion, and return on investment calculations, plus change management techniques used to drive sustained behavior change across teams and business units.
Regulatory Risk and Compliance Management
Understanding regulatory risk as a distinct category of enterprise risk and knowing how organizations build programs to manage that risk. Topics include risk identification and regulatory horizon scanning, designing compliance programs, roles and responsibilities across legal, compliance, security and business teams, escalation and remediation workflows, regulatory engagement and reporting, monitoring and testing, and how regulatory risk influences strategic decisions. Candidates should be able to explain how to measure and prioritize regulatory obligations, how to structure controls and governance to reduce exposure, and how in house counsel and compliance functions interact with business units and regulators.
Compliance and Data Protection Regulations
Understanding of regulatory requirements (GDPR, HIPAA, SOX, CCPA, PCI-DSS), implementing controls to meet compliance obligations, data retention policies, audit requirements, and working with compliance and legal teams.
Supply Chain and Third Party Risk
Encompasses identification, assessment, and mitigation of security risks introduced by external vendors, suppliers, and infrastructure dependencies across the technology supply chain. Candidates should be able to design and execute vendor security assessment frameworks and questionnaires, perform risk tiering and prioritization, and integrate vendor controls into system architecture and procurement practices. Key areas include software bill of materials and dependency mapping, supply chain integrity controls such as code signing and secure build pipelines, vulnerability and patch management for third party components, and evaluation of managed services and cloud provider dependencies. The topic also covers contractual requirements such as service level agreements and audit rights, vendor onboarding and offboarding controls, continuous monitoring and telemetry for vendor posture, incident response coordination with third parties, remediation and escalation processes, key performance indicators and governance for a vendor risk program, and automation and tooling to scale assessments and monitoring. Interviewers may ask candidates to design a comprehensive vendor risk management program, address supply chain attack vectors, and align third party security practices with compliance obligations and organizational risk appetite.
Security Privacy and Compliance
Comprehensive knowledge of security policy, privacy principles, regulatory compliance, and ethical considerations across the system lifecycle. Candidates should be able to discuss security governance and policy creation, rules of engagement for testing, authorized scope and documentation requirements for penetration testing, and the ethical and legal boundaries of security research. Understand incident response procedures when vulnerabilities are discovered and how security testing and controls support audits. Be familiar with major compliance frameworks and laws such as Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard, Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, Service Organization Control Two, General Data Protection Regulation, and California Consumer Privacy Act, and how to map controls to requirements. Technical skills include security architecture principles, authentication and authorization patterns, encryption strategies for data in transit and data at rest, key management and secrets management, secure design and privacy by design, data governance and minimization, threat modeling and risk assessment, vulnerability management, logging and monitoring, and how to evolve security posture as systems scale. Candidates should also be able to explain operational practices for secure deployment, secure configuration, trade offs between security and usability, and how to measure and improve compliance over time.
Information Technology Governance and Policy
Designing and operating information technology governance structures and policies that align technology decisions with business objectives. This includes creating governance committees and charters, defining roles and responsibilities for decision making and oversight, selecting and tailoring governance frameworks such as the information technology infrastructure library and control objectives for information and related technologies, establishing policy lifecycle and enforcement mechanisms, ensuring compliance and audit readiness, and monitoring governance effectiveness with measurable indicators.
Compliance Program Design and Management
Covers the end to end design, development, scaling, and operation of organizational compliance programs and the related risk management processes. Candidates should understand governance structures and roles and responsibilities for compliance, the core program components such as policies and procedures, training and awareness, monitoring and testing, incident reporting and investigation, corrective actions and remediation planning, and metrics for measuring program effectiveness. The topic includes risk identification and risk assessment approaches, translating risk into risk based controls, designing monitoring and auditing strategies, audit trails and approval workflows, and balancing control effectiveness with operational efficiency. Candidates should be able to explain preparing for and responding to audits and regulatory inquiries, evolving the program as the organization grows or as regulations change, aligning compliance objectives with business goals, and selecting and applying compliance frameworks and supporting technologies. Familiarity with widely used control frameworks such as the Committee of Sponsoring Organizations Internal Control Integrated Framework and Sarbanes Oxley Act requirements as well as industry specific compliance architectures is expected. For entry level roles focus on understanding why components exist and how they interconnect rather than designing a program from scratch.