Security Engineer - Cryptanalysis (Remote Contract)
Listing checked September 22, 2026 · pay as published by AfterQuery
Overview
AfterQuery is assembling a research cohort of senior security experts who work across cryptanalysis and reverse engineering. The job centers on AI evaluation: you design hard problems that mirror real expert work, write reference solutions and grading rubrics, then judge how frontier models handle those problems. This is research and evaluation, not production engineering. The contract runs remote and asynchronous at about 4 hours per week, with pay between $100 and $170 per hour.
What You'll Do7
- 1Create realistic technical scenarios and problem sets that match the depth of cryptanalysis or reverse engineering work.
- 2Write expert-level reference answers that show what a correct solution looks like.
- 3Build grading rubrics that separate shallow answers from expert-level reasoning.
- 4Review AI-generated outputs for correctness, depth, and domain judgment.
- 5Provide structured written feedback that explains where a model's answer fails or succeeds.
- 6Calibrate problem difficulty so tasks test real expertise rather than trivia.
- 7Document the reasoning behind your grading decisions for other researchers.
Requirements7
- 1Hands-on security work: you practiced cryptanalysis or reverse engineering in a hands-on role, now or in the recent past, not just studied it from a distance.
- 2Strong technical writing: you can explain complex attack techniques, grading choices, and model errors in clear prose.
- 3Independent remote work: you manage your own schedule and communicate through written updates.
- 4Meets the experience and education bar in the full job description.
- 5Preferred: a research publication record, open-source security contributions, or recognized work in cryptanalysis or reverse engineering.
- 6Preferred: experience reviewing, grading, or editing other engineers' technical work.
- 7Preferred: CTF participation, reverse engineering projects, or cryptanalysis research that shows practical skill.
Who Should Apply
Senior security practitioners who live in cryptanalysis or reverse engineering and want to shape how AI models reason about those fields. The role fits someone who reviews, grades, or writes up technical work and can point to CTF results, published research, or open-source tools as proof. You need a remote setup and the discipline to write clear feedback without meetings. Candidates who only have classroom exposure to security, or who need synchronous collaboration to stay productive, will struggle here. A common reason applications get rejected is failing to show active hands-on work; another is submitting a generic resume without examples of evaluating or explaining others' technical output.
Salary Insight
The listing pays $100 to $170 per hour for contract work at about 4 hours per week. That range matches senior-level security research and evaluation contracts, and the top end tends to go to experts with a public research record or years of hands-on cryptanalysis and reverse engineering. Your exact rate depends on experience, as the listing notes.
Pay and demand for Hardware & Embedded Systems roles
AggregatedTypical pay
$75/hour
This role
$100–$170/hr
Most Hardware & Embedded Systems roles pay $55–$96 per hour. This role's pay sits above that range.
Based on 139 similar roles that publish pay · 11 publish only a top rate; those count at the rate they gave
Rates shown per hour. Yearly and monthly pay converted; one-time fees and non-USD pay are not included.
- Live similar roles
- 158
- Listed in last 30 days
- 91
- Remote
- 97%
Hiring most right now: micro1 (61) · Neon (27) · Mercor (21)
Most requested skills · share of roles
- technical writing19%
- red teaming13%
- reverse engineering11%
- penetration testing11%
Figures from Hardware & Embedded Systems roles live on NearSkill when this page loaded. A role can close before you apply, so check the listing itself.
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Compensation
$100–170/hr
Required Skills
Application Tip
Send a short dossier that proves hands-on work and writing skill: a CTF writeup, a reverse engineering report, a cryptanalysis paper, or a link to reviewed code. Add one paragraph on how you grade or review technical work, since this role asks you to build rubrics and structured feedback. That evidence lifts your fit score more than a list of tools.
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Your resume is scanned against this role’s requirements to check qualification fit.
2Screened before the employer sees it
Only profiles that clear screening are passed on.
3Outcome by email
We notify you at the address on your resume once the screening is reviewed.
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