Senior SOC/Cyber Network Defense Analyst (CNDA)

Gray Tier Technologies is looking for a SOC/Cyber Network Defense Analyst (CNDA) Senior to support The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Hunt and Incident Response Team (HIRT). DHS HIRT secures the Nation’s cyber and communications infrastructure. HIRT provides DHS’s front-line response for cyber incidents and proactively hunting for malicious cyber activity. Gray Tier Technologies performs HIRT investigations to develop a preliminary diagnosis of the severity of breaches. Gray Tier provides HIRT remote and onsite advanced technical assistance, proactive hunting, rapid onsite incident response, and immediate investigation and resolution using host-based and network-based cybersecurity analysis capabilities. This role provides remote and onsite advanced technical assistance for proactive hunting, rapid onsite incident response, and immediate investigation and resolution using host-based, network-based and cloud-based cybersecurity analysis capabilities. Team personnel provide front line response for digital forensics/incident response (DFIR) and proactively hunting for malicious cyber activity. The CNDA uses information collected from a variety of sources to monitor network activity and analyze it for evidence of suspicious behavior. Monitoring and analysis are performed to identify and report events that occur, or might occur, within the network, in order to protect information, information systems, and networks from threats.

Responsibilities:

- Characterize and analyze network traffic to identify anomalous activity and potential threats to network resources

- Coordinate with enterprise-wide cyber defense staff to validate network alerts

- Document and escalate incidents (including event's history, status, and potential impact for further action) that may cause ongoing and immediate impact to the environment

- Perform cyber defense trend analysis and reporting

- Perform event correlation using information gathered from a variety of sources within the enterprise to gain situational awareness and determine the effectiveness of an observed attack

- Provide daily summary reports of network events and activity relevant to cyber defense practices

- Receive and analyze network alerts from various sources within the enterprise and determine possible causes of alerts

- Provide timely detection, identification, and alerting of possible attacks/intrusions, anomalous activities, and misuse activities and distinguish these incidents and events from benign activities

- Use cyber defense tools for continual monitoring and analysis of system activity to identify malicious activity

- Analyze identified malicious activity to determine weaknesses exploited, exploitation methods, effects on system and information

- Identify and analyze anomalies in network traffic using metadata

- Validate intrusion detection system (IDS) alerts against network traffic using packet analysis tools

- Identify applications and operating systems of a network device based on network traffic

- Reconstruct a malicious attack or activity based off network traffic

- Identify network mapping and operating system (OS) fingerprinting activities

- Assist in the construction of signatures which can be implemented on cyber defense network tools in response to new or observed threats within the network environment or enclave

Required Skills/Clearances:

- U.S. Citizenship with active Secret clearance

- Ability to obtain Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Entry on Duty (EOD) Suitability and TS/SCI clearance

- 8 years of direct relevant experience in cyber defense analysis using leading edge technologies and industry standard cyber defense tools

Experience with:

• successfully developing and deploying signatures

• detecting host and network-based intrusions via intrusion detection technologies (e.g., Snort)

• implementing incident handling methodologies

• implementing protocol analyzers

• collecting data from a variety of cyber defense resources

• reading and interpreting signatures (e.g. snort)

• performing packet-level analysis

• conducting trend analysis

Desired Skills:

- Python programming experience

- Strong math and science background

- Experience with Carnegie Mellon SiLK tool suite

Required Education:

BS Computer Science, Cyber Security, Computer Engineering, or related degree; or HS Diploma & 10 years of network investigations experience.

Desired Certifications:

• One or more of the following professional certifications: GNFA, GCIH, GCIA, GSEC, CASP , CySA , PaLMS, FedVTE

• GSEC (SANS401), Arcsight (or other SEIM solution), Network , Security