Principal Security Architect

Job Summary

Kinross Gold is seeking a Principal Security Architect to lead the design and continuous evolution of our incident response and cyber defense architecture. This is a senior, hands‑on‑yet‑strategic role: you will set the technical direction for how Kinross detects, contains, and recovers from threats across a global, hybrid environment spanning corporate IT, cloud, and operating mine sites.

Key Responsibilities

• Own the end‑to‑end architecture of the incident response capability — detection, triage, containment, eradication, recovery, and post‑incident review — across IT, cloud, and OT environments.
• Design, develop, and continuously improve playbooks, escalation paths, and response automation (SOAR / agentic workflows), ensuring human oversight at decision points that carry material risk.
• Lead major and complex security incidents, providing senior technical authority and adversarial perspective when automated tooling reaches its limits.

Cyber Defense Design

• Define the reference architecture for defensive controls: SIEM/analytics, EDR/XDR, identity protection, network segmentation, and cloud security posture.
• Establish detection engineering standards and validate AI‑ and analytics‑driven detections to prevent control gaps from over‑trusting automated output.
• Conduct threat modeling and attack‑path analysis against novel and AI‑driven threats, prioritizing creative problem solving over checklist‑driven, vendor‑led control selection.

AI Oversight & Governance

• Govern the responsible use of AI within the security function — setting guardrails for where automation is trusted, where human validation is mandatory, and how AI outputs are verified.
• Assess and secure the organization’s growing use of AI systems and agents as an emerging attack surface.

Strategic & Cross‑Functional Influence

• Serve as a trusted advisor to security leadership, translating technical threat and risk into business terms for non‑technical stakeholders.
• Partner with cloud, infrastructure, enterprise architecture, and operational teams to embed security‑by‑design into digital and AI initiatives.
• Mentor and provide technical oversight to incident responders and analysts, pairing senior judgment with hands‑on coaching to keep core skills strong across the team.

Technical Skills

• Incident response & forensics: deep, hands‑on expertise across the IR lifecycle, including digital forensics, malware triage, log analysis, and root‑cause investigation.
• Detection & response tooling: advanced command of SIEM, SOAR, EDR/XDR, and threat intelligence platforms; able to architect, integrate, and tune them at enterprise scale.
• Cloud & hybrid security: strong working knowledge of securing cloud (Azure, AWS) and on‑premises environments, including identity, network segmentation, and cloud security posture management.
• Threat & vulnerability management: proven ability in attack‑path analysis, adversary emulation, and vulnerability prioritization against both conventional and novel/AI‑driven threats.
• AI‑augmented security: ability to design, supervise, and validate AI‑ and analytics‑driven detection and response, and to secure AI systems and agents as an attack surface.
• Architecture & engineering: skilled in security architecture design, and at least one scripting language (e.g., Python, PowerShell) for automation.

Soft Skills

• Adversarial thinking: the instinct to anticipate how an attacker behaves and to question assumptions that automated tooling cannot challenge on its own.
• Sound judgment under pressure: calm, decisive leadership during active incidents, balancing speed with risk.
• Communication & translation: able to abstract complex security needs into clear business language for executives, the board, and non‑technical stakeholders.
• Cross‑functional influence: builds trust and drives alignment across IT, business, and operational teams without relying on direct authority.
• Mentorship & collaboration: develops talent, coaches junior analysts, and sustains peer‑review and knowledge‑sharing as routine work automates.
• Adaptability & continuous learning: embraces evolving responsibilities and emerging technologies with curiosity rather than resistance.
• Ethical stewardship: applies responsible judgment to AI oversight and high‑stakes risk decisions.

Qualifications and Skills

• 10+ years in cybersecurity, with significant depth in security architecture; senior incident‑handling experience required.
• Proven track record designing defensive architectures in complex, hybrid (on‑premises + cloud) enterprise environments.
• Strong command of detection/response tooling (SIEM, EDR/XDR, SOAR).
• Demonstrated adversarial thinking, threat modeling, and complex risk assessment.
• Excellent ability to abstract security needs from business direction and communicate to both technical and executive audiences.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience securing or governing AI/ML systems and AI‑augmented security operations.
• Background in operational technology (OT) or critical infrastructure / industrial environments.
• Relevant certifications (e.g., GCIH, GCIA, GREM, CISSP, SABSA, cloud security certifications).
• Experience operating as a force multiplier — supervising automated systems and lean, high‑skill teams.

What Success Looks Like

• Faster, more consistent containment and recovery from incidents, with measurable reduction in manual response toil.
• Defensive architecture that adapts to novel threats rather than relying solely on compliance‑driven controls.
• A team that uses AI to extend its reach while retaining sharp human judgment on the highest‑stakes decisions.

Compensation and Total Rewards

The base salary range for this role is $145,000 to $170,000 CAD plus a target Short‑Term Incentive bonus of 25% and a 15% target Long‑Term Incentive and group benefit coverage. The hiring range reflects our targeted compensation framework for the role. The actual offer will be determined through a comprehensive evaluation of each candidate’s experience, capabilities, and potential impact, along with consideration of internal equity, team structure, and benchmark market data for similar positions. In addition to base salary, Kinross offers a comprehensive total rewards package designed to support employee well‑being, performance, and long‑term development.

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