Senior Data Scientist, Applied ML

SpyCloud is on a mission to make the internet a safer place by disrupting the criminal underground. SpyCloud’s solutions thwart cyberattacks and protect more than 4 billion accounts worldwide. Cybersecurity is an exciting, evolving space, and being at the forefront of the fight to disrupt cybercrime makes SpyCloud a special place to work. If you’re driven to align your career with a fantastic mission, look no further!

We're looking for a Senior Data Scientist, Applied ML to design, build, and deploy models for critical cybersecurity use cases like incident detection and mitigation, fraud intelligence, and risk scoring.

You'll own the full model lifecycle — from data understanding and preparation through prototyping and deployment in production — and work closely with engineering, product, and research teams to turn complex problems into scalable, reliable systems. This role is ideal for someone who thrives in applied, hands-on environments where impact and collaboration matter, and who has genuinely owned data work end-to-end.

What You'll Do:

You will develop, train, and deploy models using real-world structured and unstructured data to power critical security features such as threat detection and alerting, entity resolution and risk scoring, and natural language-based tagging and classification. You'll build the preprocessing and feature engineering pipelines your own models depend on, and you'll own model monitoring and evaluation, designing feedback loops to continuously improve accuracy and effectiveness.

You'll be equally comfortable prototyping new approaches from scratch and taking existing prototypes — from our R&D team or your own experimentation — to production-grade reliability. This role sits deliberately at the intersection of research and deployment, not on one side of it: you'll take ownership of data validation, transformation, and pipeline health across the handoff points between research and production, not just within the boundaries of your own models.

Working closely with software and data engineers, you'll help productionize models in modern cloud-native environments like AWS.

This role is highly collaborative. You'll partner with product managers and domain experts to define success criteria, rapidly prototype MVPs to test new features or signals, and work with the data engineering team to access and understand diverse data sources, owning the transformation and validation steps throughout. Your input will also contribute to broader system design and architectural decisions.

Strong communication and documentation skills are essential. You will clearly articulate model design choices, tradeoffs, and outcomes to both technical and non-technical stakeholders, maintain thorough documentation for models, pipelines, and evaluation methodologies, and participate in model and compliance reviews and customer-facing discussions as needed.

Requirements:

• 4+ years of experience building and shipping models in production with direct, hands-on ownership of the data lifecycle around them
• Strong background in applied math (linear algebra, optimization, statistics) and machine learning
• Demonstrated experience leveraging Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques for text classification, tagging, or entity extraction
• Proficiency in Python and key ML libraries: PyTorch, TensorFlow, scikit-learn, XGBoost
• Demonstrated experience building or maintaining data/feature pipelines (e.g., with Airflow, Spark, Pandas) as part of your own modeling work
• Comfort with model versioning and monitoring in production (e.g., MLflow, DVC) 
• Working experience deploying models into cloud environments or containerized services
• Strong communication skills and the ability to translate complex problems into actionable solutions

Nice to Have:

• Deeper MLOps/DevOps/data engineering exposure: infra-as-code, CI/CD depth, etc.
• Familiarity with cybersecurity datasets or domains: threat intelligence, account takeover, ransomware, etc.
• Exposure to graph analytics, knowledge graphs, or cybersecurity frameworks like MITRE ATT&CK
• Background working with unstructured data (e.g., log files, threat reports, breach datasets)

Base Salary Range: $154,000 – $200,000

The salary range reflects the expected base compensation for a fully qualified candidate at this level based on experience, qualifications, and market data at the time of posting.

U.S.-Based Benefits + Perks (for Full Time Employees):

At SpyCloud, we are committed to working alongside individuals who are equally passionate about preventing cybercrime, regardless of their department or role. Guided by our core values in all business decisions, we prioritize unity in our mission and ensure all SpyCloud employees have the support and benefits they need to stay focused on our goals. In addition to our engaging workspace in South Austin, flexible and remote-friendly work options, and competitive salary package, we offer our employees a comprehensive benefits package that includes:

• 401(k) with Employer Contribution
• Health, Vision, and Dental Insurance
  • Health Savings Account (HSA) available with Employer Contribution
• Employer Paid Life, Short-term, and Long-term Disability Insurance
• Generous PTO Plan and 16 paid holidays per year

U.K.-Based Benefits + Perks (for Full Time Employees):

• Retirement Savings Plan with Employer Contribution
• Employer Provided Private Health Insurance and Healthcare Cashplan
• Employer Paid Life Insurance, Income Replacement, and Critical Illness Protection
• Employee Assistance Program
• 25 days annual accrued holiday plus 8 paid bank holidays and a paid company shutdown during winter holidays

About SpyCloud:

SpyCloud transforms recaptured darknet data to disrupt cybercrime. Its automated identity threat protection solutions use advanced analytics and AI to accelerate investigations and  protect workforce, consumer, and supplier identities from the threats that matter most: authentication bypass, session hijacking, malicious insiders, account takeover, ransomware, and fraud. Its data from malware-infected devices, successful phishes, combolists, and third-party breaches also powers many popular dark web monitoring and identity theft protection offerings. Customers include 7 of the Fortune 10, along with hundreds of global enterprises, mid-sized companies, and government agencies worldwide. Headquartered in Austin, TX, SpyCloud is home to more than 250 cybersecurity experts whose mission is to protect businesses and consumers from the stolen identity data criminals are using to target them now.

To learn more and see insights on your company's exposed data, visit spycloud.com.

Our Mission:

Our mission is to make the internet a safer place by disrupting the criminal underground. Together with our customers and partners, we aim to end criminals’ ability to profit from stolen information.

Who We Are:

SpyCloud is a place for innovative, collaborative, and problem-solvers to thrive. Individually, we’re amazing, but together, we’re unstoppable. We celebrate diversity and various perspectives and aim to create an inclusive and supportive environment for all. We are proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity and Affirmative Action employer of choice. All aspects of employment decisions will be based on merit, performance, and business needs. We do not discriminate on the basis of any status protected under federal, state, or local law. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, religion, color, national origin, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, reproductive health decisions, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, status as a protected veteran, status as an individual with a disability, genetic information, political views or activity, or other applicable legally protected characteristics. Women, minorities, individuals with disabilities, and protected veterans are encouraged to apply. SpyCloud complies with applicable state and local laws governing nondiscrimination in employment. This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation, and training.

SpyCloud expressly prohibits any form of workplace harassment. Improper interference with the ability of SpyCloud's employees to perform their job duties may result in discipline up to and including discharge. SpyCloud shares the right to work and participates in the E-Verify program in all locations.

If you need assistance or accommodation due to a disability, you may contact us.

Our Culture:

Our culture is something really special. We’re all driven to disrupt the cybercriminal economy as we keep customer accounts safe from compromise. We support a truly worthy and serious mission, but we have fun doing it together. If you are driven, inventive, and collaborative, you’ll fit right in.

SpyCloud’s Recruitment Policy:

We will never ask an applicant for sensitive or personal financial information during the recruitment process. We advise all applicants seeking employment with SpyCloud to review available information on recruitment fraud. Anyone who suspects that they have been contacted by someone falsely representing SpyCloud should email [email protected].

Compensation Transparency Policy: 

At SpyCloud, we believe in transparency and fairness in compensation. We strive to ensure that all employees are fairly compensated for their contributions, and we openly discuss our compensation philosophy and structure. We are committed to providing competitive salaries and benefits packages to attract and retain top talent, and we encourage open dialogue and feedback regarding compensation matters.

Learn more and apply: SpyCloud Careers

SpyCloud is not sponsoring visas at this time.

For applicants residing in California, please click here to read SpyCloud's CCPA Notice.

For applicants residing in the UK, please click here to read SpyCloud's Employee Privacy Notice.