Independent Contractor Reverse Engineering Jobs in Reston, VA

At MITRE, your passion fuels work that impacts our nation and improves lives. This is where your skills strengthen national security, cybersecurity, health, transportation, and citizen services. We're a nonprofit engineering, applied research, and advanced technology organization working in the public interest. With objectivity and integrity at our core, we lead federally funded research and development centers for U.S. government agencies - collaborating with industry and academia to deliver integrated, high-impact solutions that advance our nation's health, security, and prosperity. Our people tackle the toughest technical challenges, supported by competitive benefits, meaningful career development, and a culture of innovation, collaboration, and technical excellence. Choose MITRE for a career with purpose - and help shape the future. MITRE's Electronic Systems Security department is seeking to hire talented and creative engineers with a focus on hardware reverse engineering of embedded systems to support advanced research and development projects of national significance. Qualified candidates will join a department with deep technical expertise across many embedded security disciplines including software vulnerability research and reverse engineering, hardware reverse engineering, secure computing, implementation security, and wireless security. Our diverse set of sponsors and research objectives provide a wide variety of opportunities to advance the state-of-the-art in embedded security. Roles & Responsibilities: Senior engineers in the embedded hardware reverse engineering team will develop and apply their technical expertise to: * Perform hands-on security assessments of embedded systems
* Design and build prototypes to demonstrate advanced capabilities for measuring and instrumenting board- and component-level interfaces
* Develop software for orchestrating complex lab experiments, instrumenting hardware and lab equipment for data collection, measurement, and analysis
* Research and develop new approaches and countermeasures for emerging threats to embedded systems
* Shape creative and innovative ideas through internal research programs to advance the state-of-the-art in hardware security
* Track, adapt, and apply academic and industry advances in hardware security analysis and protection techniques to secure our sponsors' systems
* Collaborate with multidisciplinary teams conducting embedded security research, vulnerability assessment, and hardware/software co-design.
* Work as part of a multi-disciplinary team, while leading tasks and/or teams of engineers
* Communicate and document technical approaches, risks, and results to sponsors and stakeholders
* Provide technical mentorship to junior engineers Basic Qualifications: * Bachelor's degree in Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, or a related technical field and 5 years of related experience; or Master's degree/PhD in a similar field and 3 years of related experience
* Experience with embedded system tear-down, board-level reverse engineering, vulnerability analysis, and circuit/component modifications
* Experience with board- and component-level instrumentation, measurement, and protocol analysis
* Experience with printed circuit board design, layout, and understanding of component packaging
* Experience with software development (e.g., C/C++, Python)
* Understanding of protections against physical attacks including secure boot, tamper sensing, secure key storage, memory encryption/authentication, and debug interface disablement
* Ability to independently execute complex technical work in collaborative environments
* Effective oral and written communication skills
* Applicants selected for this position will be subject to a US government security investigation and must be able to obtain a Department of Defense SECRET clearance
* Per the U.S. Government's eligibility requirements, you must be a U.S Citizen to be considered for a security clearance. * This position requires a minimum of 4 days a week on-site Preferred Qualifications: * Master's degree or PhD in Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, or a related field.
* Active security clearance, especially Top Secret or TS/SCI.
* Experience with netlist recreation of printed circuit boards using X-ray or destructive imaging
* Experience with prototyping printed circuit boards for probing or injecting high-speed signals
* Experience with solder rework/chip-off techniques and non-volatile memory extraction
* Experience with anti-tamper design, implementation, evaluation, and/or research
* Experience developing embedded software in C/C++
* Demonstrated technical leadership and mentoring experience
* Experience with one or more, and familiarity with all, of the following technical areas:
* Application of side-channel analysis and/or fault injection to black-box systems
* Analysis of cryptographic algorithms and protocols
* Analysis of RF protocols
* Analysis of security architectures of modern commercial processors and SoCs
* Embedded firmware reverse engineering
* FPGA and/or system-on-chip (SoC) development
* Signal processing This requisition requires the candidate to have a minimum of the following clearance(s):
None This requisition requires the hired candidate to have or obtain, within one year from the date of hire, the following clearance(s):
Secret Salary compensation range and midpoint:
$126,800 - $158,500 - $190,200 Annual Work Location Type:
Onsite It is unlawful in Massachusetts to require or administer a lie detector test as a condition of employment or continued employment. An employer who violates this law shall be subject to criminal penalties and civil liability. Commitment to Non-Discrimination All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to disability, status as a protected veteran or any other status protected by applicable federal, state, local or international law. MITRE intends to maintain a website that is fully accessible to all individuals. If you are unable to search or apply for jobs and would like to request a reasonable accommodation for any part of MITRE's employment process, please email for general support and for intern positions. This service is for individuals requiring reasonable accommodation requests. Please note that vendor solicitations will not receive a reply. Benefits information may be found here . Copyright © 1997-2026, The MITRE Corporation. All rights reserved. MITRE is a registered trademark of The MITRE Corporation. Material on this site may be copied and distributed with permission only.