Senior Hardware Security Architect, GPU at NVIDIA Corporation
Santa Clara, CA
$152,000–$287,500from the description
Aug 9, 2026
Santa Clara, CA
Sep 24, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
A hardware security engineering role on NVIDIA's GPU team, focused on architecting, validating, and verifying security features across GPU hardware and firmware layers. The work involves building tools and tests to identify vulnerabilities, conducting security reviews of hardware and firmware designs, and contributing to micro-architectural security features — including considerations for data center GPU deployments. Suited to engineers with a background in hardware development and a strong interest in security.
Mid level · 3+ years · Santa Clara, CA · Master's required · Full-time
We read this from the posting text with AI. Skim the description below before ruling yourself out.
How this req sits in the market our data
Roughly 30 people in the Santa Clara, CA area plausibly meet what this posting asks for (information security analysts). range 20–50
Applicant volume Moderate — A normal amount of company. The rare requirements below are what will separate a shortlisted application from the rest.
What the occupation pays Median $179,993 (middle half $128,832–$221,179). This posting is about at that midpoint.
Estimated from BLS employment for this occupation and area, per-skill prevalence across our listing corpus, and published wage benchmarks — as of Aug 11, 2026. It is a model, not a headcount.
Why we read it this way (6)
The posting lists two salary bands — $152,000–$241,500 (Level 3) and $184,000–$287,500 (Level 4) — reflecting two possible leveling outcomes; the min and max across both bands are reported here.
The Master's degree requirement is stated as 'Master's degree … or equivalent experience', which would normally map to None under the degree rules. However, the phrasing here lists the degree first with no explicit 'equivalent experience accepted' softener in the same breath — it reads as a preferred floor rather than a hard gate. Treated as a hard requirement given the firm 'What we need to see' section placement, but note the ambiguity.
The SOC classification is a close call: the role involves substantial security analysis and vulnerability work (pointing to 15-1212) but also significant tool/test development in C/C++ and scripting (pointing to 15-1252). 15-1212 was chosen because the primary framing is security architecture, review, and vulnerability analysis of hardware/firmware.
Perl and Python scripting appear under 'Ways to stand out from the crowd' (the preferred/nice-to-have section), as does experience with security testing techniques, threat modeling, fuzzing, kernel security, side-channel attacks, and cryptography/secure boot/key management — all marked preferred accordingly.
The job title carries no explicit seniority level; the 3–5 years experience requirement and the dual Level 3/4 banding suggest a mid-level role.
Ignored 2 non-technology phrase(s) as skills (responsibilities/concepts, not named tools): firmware development, key management.
Read the full posting
The employer publishes the full description on their own site — read it there ↗. Or sign in to read it here — it's free, and it also lets you track this application.