Azure Cloud Security Engineer

LightFeather is seeking an Azure Cloud Security Engineer to help secure an enterprise Azure platform for a federal customer. You'll join a cloud security team that protects a shared Azure environment and guides the application teams who build on it. You'll recommend secure architectures, review configurations, and enforce tenant-wide security controls. The right person has strong security fundamentals, communicates clearly with customers, and enjoys learning new services quickly.

• Location: Hybrid-on-site 4 days per week in the Washington, DC metro area.
• Job Type: Full-time
• Salary: $120,000-$130,000 annually, based on experience level. 
• Clearance Requirement: U.S. citizenship is required for this position due to federal contract requirements and the need to obtain and maintain a Secret-level security clearance

Key Responsibilities

• Advise customer teams on secure architecture, service usage, access design, and workload deployment best practices.
• Review customer service configurations and proposed changes, and give clear recommendations and reference guidance.
• Explain landing zone templates and where shared responsibility falls once customers take over their environments.
• Secure the workloads and services the team deploys.
• Design and maintain tenant-wide governance controls, including Conditional Access, Azure Policy, and Microsoft Defender for Cloud regulatory compliance.
• Evaluate and apply new Microsoft security features and Zero Trust capabilities as the platform grows.
• Extend Zero Trust principles to emerging services such as Azure Databricks and AI workloads. That includes least privilege, mutual authentication, default-deny access, and tenant isolation.
• Support security operations with guidance on logging architecture, including audit, diagnostic, and traceable logs, and on reporting requirements.
• Automate security and management tasks with scripting.

Required Qualifications

• Active Secret clearance and the ability to obtain Top Secret.
• 3+ years of hands-on experience securing Microsoft Azure environments.
• Strong Azure infrastructure security fundamentals.
• Hands-on experience with Conditional Access, Azure Policy, and Defender for Cloud.
• Solid grasp of Zero Trust concepts: least privilege, shared responsibility, mutual authentication (mTLS), and the differences between tenancy, access, and continuous authentication.
• Excellent written and verbal communication, including direct, frequent work with customers over Microsoft Teams and other collaboration tools.
• Adaptability and a drive to pick up new technologies and responsibilities.

Preferred Qualifications

• Microsoft certifications: AZ-500 (strongly preferred), AZ-104, SC-300, SC-900, or SC-200
• Azure CLI and Microsoft Graph PowerShell.
• Terraform and Python.
• Working knowledge of NIST SP 800-53.
• Experience securing Azure Databricks or other data platforms.
• Exposure to AI model governance and security.
• Familiarity with SOC operations and logging requirements.

Why Join LightFeather?

At LightFeather, you're not just taking a job-you're joining a purpose-driven team that delivers innovative, mission-critical solutions to make a real difference. You'll work on diverse, meaningful projects that challenge and inspire you, alongside some of the best minds in the industry.

LightFeather is an Equal Opportunity Employer. We consider all qualified applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability, veteran status, genetic information, or any other status protected by applicable federal, state, or local law.