Skip to main content
U.S. flag

Lead IT Cybersecurity Specialist

National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Headquarters, NASA
This job announcement has closed

Summary

As a Cyber Incident Response Team Lead with the NASA Security Operations, Cyber Security Service Line, Cyber Security and Privacy Division, you will be responsible for the day-to-day cyber security incident response team leadership leading Cyber Threat Hunting, Cyber Forensics, Incident Triage, and Cyber Incident Response Team(s). You will lead a highly qualified, geographically dispersed team of cyber security incident response experts in conducting off- and on-site cyber incident response.

Overview

Help
Hiring complete
Open date: 10/31/2022
Closed date: 11/14/2022
Location
1 vacancy in the following location:
Work site options
Telework eligible
Yes—as determined by the agency policy.
Remote job
No
Relocation expenses reimbursed
No
Salary
$111,521 - $176,300 per year

Salary range reflects the lowest and highest potential salaries of NASA locations. Actual salary range varies by selectee(s) location.

Pay scale & grade
GS 14
Promotion potential
14
Pay scale and grade determines the salary of the job.
Work schedule
Full-time
Travel Required
Occasional travel - You may be expected to travel for this position.
Appointment type
Permanent
Occupations and job series
Supervisory status
No
Federal service type
This job is in the Competitive Service
Drug test
Yes
Security clearance
Sensitive Compartmented Information
Position sensitivity and risk
Special-Sensitive (SS)/High Risk
Jobs require a background check and some require a security clearance. The type depends on the job.
Background check type
Announcement number
HQ-23-IMP-11689442-JMK
Control number
686154200

This job is open to

Help

Clarification from the agency

Current NASA federal employee serving on a career, career-conditional, Schedule A for individuals with disabilities, or NASA term appointment that provides eligibility to convert to a permanent appointment. ** This vacancy has been amended to extend the closing date from 11/07/22 to 11/14/22.**

Videos

Duties

Help
  • Leading the creation and implementation of end-to-end tactical and operations level cybersecurity incident response team playbooks based on technical cybersecurity expertise, applicable policies, and rules of engagement.
  • Overseeing and/or leading a team(s) performing cyber threat hunting, cyber threat detection, cyber forensics, incident analysis, cyber incident response team incident operations to respond to, mitigate, and remediate after cyber security incidents.
  • Working with stakeholders to propose and/or develop highly effective solutions for resolving computer security incidents and ensuring compliance through tools and processes that enable agile response to cyber incidents.
  • Conduct cyber incident forensics and establish chain of custody; conduct reverse engineering of malware; conduct threat analysis and track and remediate cyber incidents.
  • Conduct cyber threat hunting and detection; conduct threat analysis and track and remediate potential cyber incidents.
  • Maintaining and leveraging a robust network of cyber defenders as well as other intelligence components to better understand identified intrusion sets and deviations and to build better defensive cybersecurity incident response strategies.
  • Utilize in depth knowledge of Defensive Cyber Operations (DCO) principles to track ongoing cyber threats against the NASA enterprise and respond to network/system breaches (actual or attempted intrusion, computer viruses, worms, Trojan horses, etc.).

Requirements

Help

Conditions of employment

  • Position subject to pre-employment background security investigation
  • Current Federal employees must meet qualifications, time in grade, and three months after competitive appointment requirements by the closing date of the announcement.
  • Financial Disclosure, Drug Testing, and/or the Risk Designation for this position may differ and be required based on the duty location/NASA Center requirements.
  • Only one position will be filled, and the duty location will be determined upon selection.
  • This position may fall under a Bargaining Unit based on the duty location/NASA Center.

Qualifications

You must have one year of specialized experience equivalent to the next lower grade, which has equipped you with the particular competencies needed to successfully perform the duties of the position described above.

To qualify for GS-14, you must have one year of directly related specialized experience equivalent to the GS-13 level:

  • Leading cybersecurity incident response team activities to hunt, detect, discover, mitigate, and remediate cyber security incidents resulting in immediate remediation and containment;
  • Implementing, configuring, and managing cyber security hunt and detection tools (such as firewalls, intrusion detection and log collectors, and vulnerability scanners) in accordance with policies, procedures, and best practices;
  • Collaborating closely with stakeholders and customers to build robust and agile incident response playbooks.
AND
If you are qualifying based on experience, you must also have IT-related experience demonstrating each of the four competencies listed below:
  1. Attention to Detail - Is thorough when performing work and conscientious about attending to detail.
  2. Customer Service - Works with clients and customers (that is, any individuals who use or receive the services or products that your work unit produces, including the general public, individuals who work in the agency, other agencies, or organizations outside the Government) to assess their needs, provide information or assistance, resolve their problems, or satisfy their expectations; knows about available products and services; is committed to providing quality products and services.
  3. Oral Communication - Expresses information (for example, ideas or facts) to individuals or groups effectively, taking into account the audience and nature of the information (for example, technical, sensitive, controversial); makes clear and convincing oral presentations; listens to others, attends to nonverbal cues, and responds appropriately.
  4. Problem Solving - Identifies problems; determines accuracy and relevance of information; uses sound judgment to generate and evaluate alternatives, and to make recommendations.
Your resume must include a clear and detailed narrative description, in your own words, of how you meet the required specialized experience. Experience statements copied from a position description, vacancy announcement or other reference material constitutes plagiarism and may result in disqualification and losing consideration for the job.

Education

This job does not have an education qualification requirement.

Additional information

Additional selections may be made for similar positions across NASA within the local commuting area(s) of the location(s) identified in this announcement. By applying, you agree to have your application shared with interested selecting official(s) within NASA. CTAP/ICTAP will be cleared for any additional selection from this announcement.

If you are a current federal employee, you must meet applicable time-in-grade requirements to be considered eligible for this position. To be eligible, you must have completed a minimum of 52 weeks in a position no more than 1 grade lower than the advertised position. (Please submit your SF-50 that shows Time-in-Grade eligibility and reflects your title, series, and grade. If your eligibility for both merit promotion and/or time-in-grade cannot be determined, your application will be rated ineligible.
Note: Time-in-grade requirements also apply to applicants who have held a non-temporary, competitive service GS position in the past year.

If you have special priority selection rights under the Agency Career Transition Assistance Program (CTAP) or the Interagency Career Transition Assistance Program (ICTAP), you must:
- Indicate your eligibility when applying for a position. The questionnaire asks you to identify your ICTAP/CTAP eligibility.
- Be well qualified for this position to receive consideration. Candidates rated in the 'Best Qualified' category are considered well-qualified. Please see 'How You Will Be Evaluated' for more information.
- Submit proof that you meet the requirements for CTAP/ICTAP as indicated in 'Required Documents'

For additional information about CTAP/ICTAP eligibility, click here - https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/workforce-restructuring/employee-guide-to-career-transition/#ictap.

Qualified NASA term employees who have term conversion eligibility (Term Appointments | NASA) under the NASA Flexibility Act of 2004 will be referred and considered equally with other NASA permanent employees under internal competitive placement procedures.

Depending on position assignment, position may or may not be in a bargaining unit. To learn more about bargaining units at NASA please click here NASA Unions (Bargaining Units) | NASA.

How you will be evaluated

You will be evaluated for this job based on how well you meet the qualifications above.

You will be evaluated for this position based on how well you meet the qualifications and eligibility requirements listed in this vacancy announcement. To determine your qualifications and referral status, we may review your resume and supporting documentation and compare it against your responses to the vacancy questionnaire. Overstating your qualifications and/or experience in your application materials or application questionnaire may result in your removal from consideration.

You will be assessed on the following competencies:

  • Attention to Detail
  • Customer Service
  • Oral Communication
  • Problem Solving
  • Information Systems Security
  • Information Systems/Network Security
  • IT Architecture
  • Leadership
  • Operating Systems
  • Teamwork
  • Technical Competence
NASA considers paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations (e.g., professional; philanthropic; religious; spiritual; community, student, social). Volunteer work helps build critical competencies, knowledge, and skills and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience.

Under NASA's quality grouping process, applicants will be assessed on the position competencies and placed in one of three groups identified and defined below:
  • Best Qualified Group - Applicants who demonstrate a superior level of all evaluation criteria.
  • Highly Qualified Group - Applicants who demonstrate a satisfactory level of the evaluation criteria.
  • Qualified Group - Applicants who demonstrate the basic qualifications, with general knowledge, skills, and abilities.
Candidates eligible for ICTAP/CTAP, reemployment priority or priority consideration will be referred before other candidates, as necessary. If no such candidates apply or are eligible to be referred, the following candidates will be sent to the hiring official for employment consideration:
  • Best Qualified merit promotion candidates. Highly Qualified merit promotion candidates may also be referred, if additional candidates are needed.
  • Qualified candidates eligible for consideration under Schedule A or VRA in accordance with veterans' preference rules, as applicable.
  • Qualified candidates that are eligible for special hiring authorities or non-competitive hiring authorities.

Headquarters, NASA

Explore the Extraordinary
Calling all the innovators, pioneers, visionaries, and adventurers! We are a diverse group of professionals united by a common purpose: to discover and expand knowledge for the benefit of humanity. We're building on our rich legacy by embarking on new and exciting missions, both on Earth and beyond and we're looking for fresh ideas to help us get there. Do you have a passion for exploration? Do you want your work to leave an enduring impact? Join us in a career that can take you farther than you can imagine. At NASA, our work is more than just a profession-it's a lifelong pursuit, a passion, and a chance to change the world. NASA is more than astronauts. We are scientists, engineers, IT specialists, human resources specialists, accountants, writers, technicians and many other kinds of people working together to break barriers to achieve the seemingly impossible.

Explore the extraordinary, every day; explore a career at NASA!

Agency contact information

NASA Shared Services Contact Center
Phone
1-877-677-2123
Fax
1-866-779-6772
Email
nssc-contactcenter@mail.nasa.gov
Address
NASA Headquarters
300 E St SW
Washington, DC 20546
US

Visit our careers page

Learn more about what it's like to work at Headquarters, NASA, what the agency does, and about the types of careers this agency offers.

https://www.nasa.gov/careers

Your session is about to expire!

Your USAJOBS session will expire due to inactivity in 8 minutes. Any unsaved data will be lost if you allow the session to expire. Click the button below to continue your session.