Security Specialist Akamai
Pittsburgh, PA - USA
Job Summary
Due to the nature of the role willingness to participate in on-call/weekend/evening support is preferred.
The Akamai Security Specialist is responsible for protecting PNCs external application footprint through the design implementation and management of Akamai security controls. This role focuses on defending against advanced threats including automated attacks bot activity and API abuse while ensuring optimal performance and customer experience across digital platforms.
- Design implement and maintain Akamai security controls including Web Application Firewall (WAF) and Bot Manager policies
- Monitor and analyze traffic patterns to identify anomalous behavior malicious automation and emerging threats
- Tune and enforce security policies to proactively block unauthorized access data harvesting and application abuse
- Partner with Security Operations and incident response teams to investigate escalate and remediate security events
- Develop and maintain detection logic playbooks and standardized procedures for incident response and policy management
- Support onboarding new applications by defining and validating security configurations API protections and endpoint coverage
- Continuously optimize Akamai configurations to align with evolving threat intelligence and attack techniques
- Validate protections on high-risk business functions such as authentication flows account management and transactional APIs
- Ensure visibility monitoring and reporting capabilities support operational audit and regulatory requirements
- Contribute to documentation knowledge transfer and process standardization across the Akamai Security team
- Akamai Security Suite (e.g. Kona Site Defender / WAF Bot Manager API Protection)
- SIEM and monitoring platforms
- Web protocols (HTTP/S) networking fundamentals and application architecture
- Security tooling supports traffic inspection rule tuning and incident response
- Ticketing and workflow systems (e.g. ServiceNow Jira) for operational tracking and onboarding activities
- 3 years in cybersecurity (application network or perimeter security)
- Direct experience with Akamai Security Suite products and policy management (e.g. Kona Site Defender / WAF Bot Manager API Protection)
- Experience working in Security Operations Attack Surface Management or application protection environment
- Strong knowledge of web security (OWASP Top 10) HTTP/S and application architecture
- Strong understanding of web application security and common attack vectors (e.g. OWASP Top 10)
- Experience analyzing network traffic logs and security events to identify threats
- Ability to interpret and apply threat intelligence to security controls and detection strategies
- Knowledge of API security and protection against automated and high-speed attack techniques
- Familiarity with cloud and web-based application architectures
- Experience defending against automated threats bots or scraping activity
- Familiarity with financial services or highly regulated environments
- Knowledge of Zero Trust concepts and modern application security frameworks
- Strong problem-solving skills with the ability to balance security enforcement and customer experience
- Effective communication skills with the ability to collaborate across security infrastructure and application teams
PNC Employees take pride in our reputation and to continue building upon that we expect our employees to be:
- Customer Focused - Knowledgeable of the values and practices that align customer needs and satisfaction as primary considerations in all business decisions and able to leverage that information in creating customized customer solutions.
- Managing Risk - Assessing and effectively managing all of the risks associated with their business objectives and activities to ensure they adhere to and support PNCs Enterprise Risk Management Framework.
Successful candidates must demonstrate appropriate knowledge skills and abilities for a role. Listed below are skills competencies work experience education and required certifications/licensures needed to be successful in this position.
To learn more about these and other programs including benefits for full time and part-time employees visit.
If an accommodation is required to participate in the application process please contact us via email at . Please include accommodation request in the subject line title and be sure to include your name the job ID and your preferred method of contact in the body of the email. Emails not related to accommodation requests will not receive responses. Applicants may also call and say Workday for accommodation assistance. All information provided will be kept confidential and will be used only to the extent required to provide needed reasonable accommodations.
At PNC we foster an inclusive and accessible workplace. We provide reasonable accommodations to employment applicants and qualified individuals with a disability who need an accommodation to perform the essential functions of their positions.
PNC provides equal employment opportunity to qualified persons regardless of race color sex religion national origin age sexual orientation gender identity disability veteran status or other categories protected by law.
This position is subject to the requirements of Section 19 of the Federal Deposit Insurance Act (FDIA) and for any registered role the Secure and Fair Enforcement for Mortgage Licensing Act of 2008 (SAFE Act) and/or the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) which prohibit the hiring of individuals with certain criminal history.
Required Experience:
IC