Penetration Tester (Senior)

About Starling

Starling is the UK’s first and leading digital bank on a mission to fix banking! We built a new kind of bank because technology had the power to help people save, spend and manage their money in a new and transformative way. We’re a fully licensed UK bank with the culture and spirit of a fast-moving, disruptive tech company. We employ more than 3,000 people across our London, Southampton, Cardiff and Manchester offices. Our technologists are at the very heart of Starling and enjoy working in a fast-paced environment that is all about building things, creating new stuff, and disruptive technology that keeps us on the cutting edge of fintech. We operate a flat structure to empower you to make decisions regardless of what your primary responsibilities may be, innovation and collaboration will be at the core of everything you do. Help is never far away in our open culture, you will find support in your team and from across the business, we are in this together!

The way to thrive and shine within Starling is to be a self-driven individual and be able to take full ownership of everything around you: From building things, designing, discovering, to sharing knowledge with your colleagues and making sure all processes are efficient and productive to deliver the best possible results for our customers. Our purpose is underpinned by five Starling values: Listen, Keep It Simple, Do The Right Thing, Own It, and Aim For Greatness.

Hybrid Working

We have a Hybrid approach to working here at Starling - our preference is that you’re located within a commutable distance of one of our offices so that we’re able to interact and collaborate in person.

About the Role

As an experienced Penetration Tester you will be working with talented cyber security professionals to protect Starling customers, company assets and systems using the latest technologies and techniques. The primary objective for this role is to collaborate with, support, and guide Starling’s engineering and operation functions to ensure our services are designed, developed and operated securely. As an experienced member of our penetration testing team you will directly interact with multiple areas of the business to understand requirements, define the scope and approach to testing (including undertaking appropriate research), and produce reporting information aligned to our risk framework. In addition, we understand the importance of knowledge and expertise remaining current and you shall support the continued advancement of our penetration testing through research, design and implementation of new solutions, including automation.

Responsibilities

• Scoping and performing mobile, web application, cloud, and infrastructure penetration tests.
• Automation of security testing, and development of internal tooling, to achieve continuous assurance.
• Collaboration with engineering teams to facilitate secure development, including:

• Review and analysis of proposed technical solutions to identify appropriate security controls.
• Input and guidance to security related technical architecture and design decisions.
• Code review of features and critical security components.
• Practical security testing.
• Advising on remediation of security issues and processes to address root causes.
• Security assurance reviews of third-party solutions.
• Identifying and implementing improvements to the team’s internal processes and procedures.
• Review, analysis and reporting of external threats relevant to Starling systems and solutions, in the context of Starling’s desired security posture.

Requirements

We’re open-minded when it comes to hiring and we care more about aptitude and attitude than specific experience or qualifications. Ideally, we would like:

• 5+ years technical information security experience.
• Experience of mobile, web application, cloud and infrastructure penetration testing.
• Strong technical knowledge in:

• Mobile security (iOS and Android)
• Web application security
• Networking and associated protocols
• Cloud security (AWS and GCP)
• Containers and Kubernetes

Interview process

Interviewing is a two way process and we want you to have the time and opportunity to get to know us, as much as we are getting to know you! Our interviews are conversational and we want to get the best from you, so come with questions and be curious. In general you can expect the below, following a chat with one of our Talent Team:

• First stage with the Penetration Testing Team Lead
• Second stage with additional members of the Penetration Testing team
• Final stage with Infosec Director and CISO

Benefits

We have a Hybrid approach to working here at Starling - our preference is that you’re located within a commutable distance of one of our offices so that we’re able to interact and collaborate in person. In Technology, we’re asking that you attend the office a minimum of 1 day per week.

• 25 days holiday (plus take your public holiday allowance whenever works best for you)
• An extra day’s holiday for your birthday
• Annual leave is increased with length of service, and you can choose to buy or sell up to five extra days off
• 16 hours paid volunteering time a year
• Salary sacrifice, company enhanced pension scheme
• Life insurance at 4x your salary