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).
Enterprise Security Operations & Scale
Discuss your experience operating security at enterprise scale: managing large networks, multiple data centers, cloud environments, or high-volume security alert processing. Explain familiarity with SOC operations, SIEM platforms, alert triage and escalation processes, and managing incidents across distributed infrastructure. At senior level, you should have perspective on designing and optimizing security operations, not just executing tasks.
Security Monitoring and Threat Detection
Covers the principles and practical design of security monitoring, logging, and threat detection across environments including cloud scale infrastructure. Topics include data collection strategies, centralized logging and storage, security information and event management architecture, pipeline and ingestion design for high volume and high velocity data, retention and indexing tradeoffs, observability and telemetry sources, and alerting and tuning to reduce noise. Detection techniques include signature based detection, anomaly detection, indicators of compromise, behavioral detection, correlation rules, and threat intelligence integration. Also covers evaluation metrics such as false positives and false negatives, detection coverage and lead time, incident escalation, playbook integration with incident response, automation and orchestration for investigation and remediation, and operational concerns such as scalability, cost, reliability, and privacy or compliance constraints.
Security Metrics and Key Performance Indicators
Define, measure, and interpret operational metrics and key performance indicators for security operations and security programs. Topics include detection rate, mean time to detect, mean time to respond, false positive rate, alert volume, analyst workload and queue depth, time to containment, and coverage of critical telemetry sources. Candidates should explain how to instrument telemetry, build dashboards, set realistic service level objectives and targets, prioritize work based on risk and business impact, avoid metric gaming, and use metrics to drive continuous improvement and communication to technical and executive stakeholders.
Comprehensive Security Leadership Capability Assessment
Holistic evaluation of your readiness for a senior security analyst role: technical depth across security domains (monitoring, incident response, vulnerability management, threat analysis), ability to architect security solutions, operational excellence, leadership and mentorship capability, strategic thinking about security program development. This is not about deep expertise in every area, but demonstrating senior-level breadth and the ability to learn and grow. Showing you understand how your role contributes to broader organizational security strategy.
Threat Detection and Evasion
Covers how defenders detect malicious activity and the techniques attackers use to avoid detection, as well as the indicators that reveal compromise. Candidates should understand sources of telemetry and what to look for in logs and network data, including suspicious file hashes, malicious network endpoints, unusual process behavior, abnormal authentication patterns, registry modifications, and persistence artifacts. Describe common detection technologies such as antivirus, host based detection, network intrusion detection systems, and security information and event management systems, and explain how signature based, heuristic, and behavioral detection differ. Explain detection engineering and threat hunting approaches, including creating detection rules, baselining normal behavior, anomaly detection, and using threat intelligence. Cover evasion and stealth techniques such as encryption and tunneling of command traffic, mimicking legitimate applications and traffic patterns, living off the land using built in operating system tools, fileless and memory resident techniques, process injection and masquerading, timing and slow low attacks, obfuscation and packing, credential theft and lateral movement, and disabling or tampering with defensive controls. Discuss how indicators of compromise may appear across host, network, and application telemetry, the limitations that cause missed detections, and defender mitigations such as improved telemetry coverage, layered detection logic, containment and response playbooks, and proactive threat hunting.
AWS and Cloud Security Familiarity
Practical familiarity with cloud platform security concepts and services, with emphasis on Amazon Web Services. Topics include identity and access design, virtual private cloud architecture and segmentation, security group and network access control policies, encryption and key management, logging and detection services, container and serverless security considerations, infrastructure as code risks and controls, cross account access patterns, and operational trade offs for scale and cost. Be prepared to describe concrete services and configurations you have used and lessons learned from incidents or deployments.
Evidence Collection and Preservation
Covers the full lifecycle of handling evidentiary materials with emphasis on digital evidence and legal admissibility. Candidates should understand how to identify and secure an evidence scene, differentiate source types such as computers, storage media, mobile devices, network equipment, and cloud artifacts, and decide on appropriate power and access actions to avoid data loss. Includes hands on collection techniques such as use of write blockers, forensic imaging and logical versus physical acquisition, capturing volatile data, and preserving originals while working from verified copies. Emphasizes documentation requirements including detailed evidence logs, chain of custody records that document who handled evidence, when, and what actions were taken, hashing and verification to prove integrity, secure transport and storage, and proper storage conditions. Also covers legal and procedural topics such as standards for admissibility, consequences of contamination, coordination with legal counsel and law enforcement, differences between internal investigations and evidence intended for litigation, issuance of legal holds and preservation orders, and maintaining audit trails for review and courtroom presentation.
Security Operations Collaboration
Covers the interpersonal and cross functional collaboration skills required to work effectively in security operations teams. Interviewers assess the ability to coordinate with other security analysts, share knowledge during on call rotations and incidents, perform clear handovers and maintain runbooks, and communicate under pressure during incident response. This topic also includes collaborating with engineering, system administration, compliance, legal, and business stakeholders to implement and remediate technical issues, prioritize vulnerabilities, and deploy controls. Candidates should be able to describe teamwork practices such as shift coordination, escalation paths, post incident retrospectives, clear documentation, constructive feedback, mentorship, and using collaboration tools to ensure continuity and operational resilience.
Threat Identification and Classification
Identify and classify security threats and suspicious activity by determining the attack vector, likely threat actor motivation, and the nature of the vulnerability or risk. Distinguish between vulnerability, threat, and risk; differentiate external versus insider threats and targeted versus opportunistic attacks; assess potential impact based on systems and data involved; and prioritize incidents by severity. Include logical approaches to evidence evaluation, indicators of compromise, attribution caveats, and recommended next steps for containment, investigation, and mitigation.