Zero Trust Network Analytics Engineer Journeyman

GovCIO is currently hiring a Zero Trust Network Analytics Engineer Journeyman to support a Zero Trust modernization project at 16AF. This role supports a fast-paced technical program focused on improving cybersecurity visibility and analytics, integrating identity and device context, assessing trust source validity, and enabling continuous, risk-informed access decisions across the enterprise. This onsite position will be located at Lackland AFB in San Antonio, Texas.

Responsibilities

This role supports the implementation, validation, and continuous improvement of Zero Trust principles through enhanced visibility and analytics. Key responsibilities include collecting and correlating identity, device, access, posture, and network telemetry; analyzing authentication and authorization outcomes; identifying policy gaps and anomalous access patterns; and developing metrics that demonstrate Zero Trust maturity and control effectiveness. The position will support the ingestion and analysis of data from Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE), including identity, endpoint profiling, posture, authentication, authorization, and policy-enforcement data. The role will also help integrate this content with multiple SIEM and security analytics platforms.

• Translate Zero Trust principles and program objectives into measurable analytics, use cases, dashboards, alerts, and validation criteria.
• Collect, normalize, correlate, and analyze identity, endpoint, posture, authentication, authorization, access, and network telemetry to support continuous verification and risk-informed decisions.
• Support Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) configurations and analytics related to endpoint discovery and profiling, identity groups, posture status, authentication, authorization, policy sets, Security Group Tags, and enforcement outcomes.
• Analyze Cisco ISE logs, reports, authentication failures, policy decisions, endpoint classifications, and access trends to identify anomalies, coverage gaps, misclassifications, and opportunities for policy refinement.
• Assist with integrating identity and device context from Cisco ISE into SIEM, security analytics, asset management, vulnerability management, and orchestration platforms.
• Develop and maintain dashboards and metrics that measure device visibility, authentication coverage, posture compliance, least-privilege enforcement, segmentation effectiveness, policy exceptions, and Zero Trust maturity.
• Support the validation and testing of Zero Trust policies by comparing intended access requirements with observed access activity and enforcement results.
• Assist analysts and engineers in investigating anomalous access behavior, unmanaged or noncompliant devices, repeated authentication failures, excessive privileges, and indicators of lateral movement.
• Write and maintain scripts, queries, and repeatable analytical procedures for data enrichment, correlation, reporting, quality validation, and control-effectiveness assessments.
• Develop and maintain documentation for analytics use cases, data sources, trust signals, policy mappings, test procedures, findings, dashboards, metrics, and standard operating procedures.

Qualifications

Bachelor’s degree in a STEM field and zero to two years of technical experience, including applicable internship experience.

Ability to obtain and retain a Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information (TS/SCI) clearance.

Required Skills and Experience

• Strong analytical, organizational, and problem-solving skills
• Ability to communicate technical concepts clearly in written and verbal formats
• Willingness to learn cybersecurity tools, enterprise environments, and Zero Trust concepts
• Ability to work effectively in a team environment
• Ability to obtain/retain applicable DoW 8140 IAT Level II certification

• Ability to collaborate effectively with cybersecurity, identity, endpoint, network, and data engineering teams.
• Ability to obtain and retain an applicable DoD 8140 IAT Level II certification.

Preferred Skills and Experience

• Internship, laboratory, research, capstone, or academic project experience involving Zero Trust, cybersecurity analytics, identity and access management, network access control, or security operations.
• Exposure to Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE), including endpoint profiling, posture assessment, policy sets, authentication and authorization policies, Security Group Tags, downloadable access control lists, pxGrid, or TrustSec.
• Familiarity with Zero Trust frameworks and guidance, such as NIST SP 800-207, the CISA Zero Trust Maturity Model, the DoD Zero Trust Strategy, the Risk Management Framework (RMF), and Security Technical Implementation Guide (STIG) requirements.
• Experience analyzing authentication, authorization, endpoint, identity, access, or policy-enforcement data to identify trends, anomalies, and control gaps.
• Exposure to SIEM or analytics platforms, such as Splunk, Elastic, or Microsoft Sentinel, including experience with query development, dashboards, alerting, and data correlation.
• Familiarity with Cisco ISE integrations involving directory services, certificate services, endpoint management tools, vulnerability management platforms, SIEM platforms, or security orchestration tools.
• Basic understanding of RADIUS, TACACS+, 802.1X, Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP) methods, certificates, Active Directory, identity groups, device profiling, and posture assessment.
• Experience defining or reporting metrics for asset visibility, identity assurance, device compliance, access-policy effectiveness, segmentation, and Zero Trust maturity.
• Academic or practical exposure to Python, PowerShell, SQL, regular expressions, REST APIs, or comparable technologies used for data analysis and automation.
• Experience using Git or another version control tool to manage queries, scripts, analytics content, policy definitions, or technical documentation.
• Interest in transforming identity, device, and security telemetry into actionable recommendations that support continuous improvement of Zero Trust policies.

• Familiarity with cybersecurity concepts such as:
  • Zero Trust
  • Least privilege
  • Multi-factor authentication
  • Security monitoring

Posted Salary Range

USD $65,000.00 - USD $75,000.00 /Yr.