staff software engineering Staff Engineer tech_leadership · Posted Apr 2, 2026
$220,000 – $405,000
USD per year

About this role

Perplexity is hiring a staff-level Staff Engineer in the software engineering function based in San Francisco, CA. The posting calls out experience with Python, AWS, GCP, Azure. Compensation is listed at $220,000–$405,000 per year.

Role
Staff Engineer
Function
software engineering
Level
staff
Track
Tech leadership
Employment
Full-time
Location
San Francisco, CA
Department
Security
Posted
Apr 2, 2026

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Job description

from Perplexity careers

Perplexity is seeking a highly skilled, experienced and hands-on Offensive Security Engineer to join our dynamic security team, taking an adversarial approach to hardening Perplexity's infrastructure, applications, and AI systems. You'll plan and execute red team operations, penetration tests, and attack simulations across our cloud infrastructure, web and mobile applications, AI/ML pipeline, and corporate environment—finding real vulnerabilities before adversaries do and working directly with engineering teams to drive remediation.

Responsibilities

  • Plan and execute red team and purple team engagements simulating advanced threat actors across cloud infrastructure (AWS, Kubernetes), endpoints, and application surfaces

  • Conduct continuous penetration testing of web applications, APIs, mobile clients, browser extensions, cloud infrastructure, and internal services

  • Assess AI/ML-specific attack surfaces including prompt injection, model exfiltration, agent abuse, tool-use exploitation, and MCP security boundaries

  • Develop and maintain custom offensive tooling, exploits, and automation to improve the efficiency and coverage of security testing

  • Perform open-scope adversary simulations that test detection and response capabilities end to end, collaborating closely with the defensive security team

  • Drive threat modeling sessions with engineering teams to identify and prioritize attack vectors in new features and architectures

  • Deliver clear, actionable findings to both technical and executive audiences; partner with engineering to validate remediations

  • Contribute to the security of CI/CD pipelines, supply chain integrity, and secrets management through offensive assessment

    This is an excerpt. Read the full job description on Perplexity careers →
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