Splunk Engineer

Spektrum supports apex purchasers (NATO, UN, EU, and National Government and Defence) and their Tier 1 supplier ecosystem with a wide range of specialist services. We provide our clients with professional services, specialised aerospace and defence sales, delivery, and operational subject matter expertise. We are looking for personnel to join our team and support key client projects.

Who we are supporting  

The NATO Communication and Information Agency (NCIA) is responsible for providing secure and effective communications and information technology (IT) services to NATO's member countries and its partners. The agency was established in 2012 and is headquartered in Brussels, Belgium.

The NCIA provides a wide range of services, including:

• Cyber Security: The NCIA provides advanced cybersecurity solutions to protect NATO's communication networks and information systems against cyber threats.
• Command and Control Systems: The NCIA develops and maintains the systems used by NATO's military commanders to plan and execute operations.
• Satellite Communications: The NCIA provides satellite communications services to enable secure and reliable communications between NATO forces.
• Electronic Warfare: The NCIA provides electronic warfare services to support NATO's mission to detect, deny, and defeat threats to its communication networks.
• Information Management: The NCIA manages NATO's information technology infrastructure, including its databases, applications, and servers.

Overall, the NCIA plays a critical role in ensuring the security and effectiveness of NATO's communication and information technology capabilities.

The program

Assistance and Advisory Service (AAS)

The NATO Communications and Information Agency (NCI Agency) is NATO’s principal C3 capability deliverer and CIS service provider. It provides, maintains and defends the NATO enterprise-wide information technology infrastructure to enable Allies to consult together under Article IV, and, when required, stand together in the face of attack under Article V.

To provide these critical services, in the modern evolving dynamic environment the NCI Agency needs to build and maintain high performance-engaged workforce. The NCI Agency workforce strategically consists of three major categorise's: NATO International Civilians (NIC)'s, Military (Mil), and Interim Workforce Consultants (IWC)'s. The IWCs are a critical part of the overall NCI Agency workforce and make up approximately 15 percent of the total workforce.

Role ID - C005335

Role Duties and Responsibilities

Under the direction of Cyber Security Data Engineering Cell Head (CSDE), or a delegated authority, the incumbent will perform duties such as the following:

• Act as one of the main engineers and Subject Matter Expert (SME) for SIEM and Log collection services within the Cyber Security Data team.
• As the SME, you will provide advice and technical assistance to other stakeholders, maintain technical expertise, awareness, and developments in related new technologies, and provide technical contributions to any projects related to the data security systems.
• Be responsible for management and further development of the data security systems;
• The contractor may occasionally be required to provide on-call support and intervene in the event of an issue to ensure the continued operational availability of the SIEM monitoring infrastructure
• Following ITIL standards, provide support to Operations and Service Delivery management covering all stages of the data security systems lifecycle (e.g. Service Design, Transition, Operations, Change Management and Continual Service Improvement).
• Ensure that data security systems are installed, configured, and operating correctly and in line with dependencies with others systems or applications required.
• Ensure that all system components are continuously monitored and take appropriate technical and non-technical actions for solving detected issues.
• Ensure that data security systems operate within any KPI's, as defined in Service Level Agreements with NCSC customers.
• Support integration with external tools and any associated activities.
• Proactively identify and propose system improvements to ensure an up-to-date and stable environment.
• Justify business needs, prepare documentation and implementation plan for the Change Management Board.
• Implement the approved changes following co-ordination with other stakeholders.
• Coordinate with service delivery managers, end users and other stakeholders in support of related services; communicate with other NATO entities as well as industry partners where required;
• Develop and maintain documentation guidelines, standard operating procedures, system and service design documents and other relevant documentation that support management of the data security systems.
• Create technical and/or executive level reports as required;
• Organise and deliver presentations and briefings for various audience up to NATO executive level.
• Perform other duties as may be required.

Essential Skills, Experience and Certifications

• At least 1 year of extensive practical experience as SIEM administrator with Splunk in large enterprise environment (deployment, installation, configuration and maintenance).
• Hands-on experience in the design and maintenance of distributed Splunk architectures.
• At least 2 years and expert level experience related to SIEM and Log collection management activities.
• Demonstrable experience of analysing and interpreting system, security and application logs in order to diagnose faults and spot abnormal behaviours.
• Practical hands-on experience in systems and tools administration, especially Linux environment;
• Comprehensive knowledge of the principles of computer and communication security, networking, and the vulnerabilities of modern operating systems and applications.
• Practical skills in writing Bash, Python or Ansible scripts to support repetitive tasks automation;
• Solid Linux system and application administration and troubleshooting skills.
• Solid understanding of regular expressions.
• Ability to develop clear and concise technical documentation, including procedures.
• Good communication abilities, both written and verbal, with the ability to clearly and successfully articulate complex issues to a variety of audiences and teams.

Essential Education

• A minimum requirement of a Bachelor's degree from a nationally recognised/certified university in a related discipline and two years post-related experience. Alternatively, the lack of a university degree may be compensated by the demonstration of a candidate's particular abilities or experience of interest to the NCI Agency, provided the candidate has at least five years of extensive and progressive expertise in duties related to the function of the post

Desirable Skills, Experience, Certification and Education

• Experience working in a regulated, high control environment such as defence, government, financial services or other enterprise sectors.
• Extensive practical experience (as system administrator) with Splunk Enterprise security, Splunk SOAR and Splunk UBA.
• Practical experience with Git software.
• Hands-on experience with Ansible as an automation technology.
• Experience in creation/modification of custom parsers.
• Software engineering including programming and/or scripting knowledge (python, shell scripting, PowerShell).
• Prior experience automating interactions between systems using APIs.
• A solid understanding of Information Security Practices; relating to the Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability of information (CIA triad.).
• Experience in developing Splunk Applications.
• Content management experience in Splunk, especially Enterprise Security and Advanced Search and Reporting.
• Hands-on experience with network infrastructure and virtualised environments.
• Previous experience working for Cyber Security related organisations (CERTs, security offices).
• Experience with log collection in cloud environment such as Azure or AWS
• Skills:
• Very good communication and analytical skills.
• Possessing industry leading certification in the area of Cyber Security such as CISSP, CISM, CISA, GSNA, and SANS GIAC.
• ITIL Service Management certifications.
• Experience in working for or supporting a military or governmental organization.
• Bachelor's degree from a nationally recognised/certified university in a related discipline and three years post-related experience.

Language Proficiency

• Business English

Working Location

• Mons, Belgium

Working Policy

• On-site

Travel

• Some travel to other NATO sites may be required

Security Clearance

• Valid National or NATO Secret personal security clearance