Security Engineering & Operations Topics
Operational security practices, secure systems implementation, threat modeling, penetration testing, vulnerability assessment, and security operations at production scale. Covers network security, endpoint security, secure architecture implementation, incident response mechanics, and security automation. Distinct from Security & Compliance (which addresses governance, compliance frameworks, and policy) and from Security Research & Innovation (which addresses novel techniques and research contributions).
Distributed System and Microservices Security
Focuses on security considerations for distributed systems, APIs, containers, and microservice ecosystems. Includes authentication and authorization approaches for APIs and service to service communication, token models and OAuth and JSON web tokens, API gateway and rate limiting strategies, secrets management and secure configuration, network segmentation and service mesh security, container and runtime image hardening, Kubernetes and orchestration security, vulnerability scanning and patch management, secure logging and tracing practices, dependency supply chain security, and compliance and governance implications. Emphasizes how security control implementation differs between monoliths and distributed architectures.
Security Architect Role Understanding
Evaluates the candidate's understanding of the security architect function. Topics include designing security frameworks and standards, conducting risk assessments and threat modeling, selecting and evaluating security technologies, defining security requirements and controls, collaborating with engineering and business teams, and distinguishing security architecture from security engineering and security operations. Candidates should explain how security architecture informs design decisions and governance.
Enterprise Cloud Security and Compliance
Designing enterprise grade cloud security and compliance architectures: network segmentation and reference topologies such as hub and spoke, virtual private cloud design, security groups and network access control lists, private connectivity options and virtual private networks, identity governance and scalable policy management, secrets and key management, encryption at rest and in transit, centralized logging and audit trails, threat detection and security monitoring, incident response and forensics, and embedding compliance controls for standards such as SOC two, HIPAA, and PCI DSS. Also includes applying common enterprise security patterns and evaluating trade offs between patterns in large organizations.
Data Governance and Security Implementation
Designing and applying technical and operational controls to protect data across storage, processing, and integration points. Topics include data classification and labeling to identify sensitive data, database and application level access controls such as role based access control and attribute based access control, encryption at rest and in transit, key management, tokenization and masking, secure handling of credentials and API keys, audit logging and immutable trails, retention and secure deletion policies, monitoring and alerting, and integration of these controls with privacy requirements and incident response processes. Candidates should be able to discuss concrete implementation patterns, trade offs, tooling choices, and testing and validation approaches.