# Distributed Systems Engineer

**Company:** [Censys](https://hotfix.jobs/companies/censys)
**Location:** Remote
**Role:** Backend Engineering
**Salary:** $151k – $191k/yr
**Experience:** 5+ years
**Skills:** Go, AWS, Azure, GCP, Aws Kinesis, Google Pub/Sub, Kafka, Bigtable, Cloud Spanner, Hbase, Cassandra, gRPC, Rest, Protobuf, Kubernetes
**Posted:** 2026-09-02

> Build and maintain highly available, scalable distributed systems, data pipelines, messaging systems, and services powering Internet intelligence products. The role requires 5+ years of distributed-systems experience and proficiency with Go, cloud platforms, databases, and messaging technologies.

## Job Description

## Responsibilities
- Build large-scale, real-time services and applications that leverage massive datasets for internal APIs and external applications.
- Build tooling, libraries, frameworks, and services supporting security, research, and data-platform initiatives.
- Productionize prototypes into reliable internal tools, services, and platform capabilities.
- Participate in planning and technical discussions with engineering and product teams.
- Develop and maintain data pipelines, messaging systems, databases, caching layers, and cloud or on-premises services.
- Collaborate with Machine Learning Engineers and Security Researchers on security-focused solutions.

## Requirements
- 5+ years of software engineering experience building distributed systems, such as data-ingestion pipelines, databases, or services.
- Object-oriented programming experience; the team uses Go.
- Experience with at least one cloud provider, such as AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud.
- Experience with or familiarity with message queues, such as AWS Kinesis, Google Pub/Sub, or Kafka.
- Experience with databases such as Bigtable, Cloud Spanner, HBase, or Cassandra.
- Understanding of distributed-systems concepts including scalability, fault tolerance, and reliability.
- Familiarity with using AI and applying it responsibly.
- Ability to write understandable, testable, maintainable code.
- Strong communication and collaboration skills.

## Nice-to-haves
- gRPC or REST experience.
- Data serialization technologies such as Protobuf or MessagePack.
- Experience building, deploying, or maintaining containerized services in Kubernetes.
- Understanding of how Internet-connected machines and services communicate through protocols and standards.
- Security-domain knowledge.

## Compensation and Benefits
- High-cost-of-living locations, including San Francisco Bay, New York City, and Seattle: $174,000–$206,000 USD base salary, plus bonus eligibility and equity.
- Other locations: $151,000–$191,000 USD base salary, plus bonus eligibility and equity.
- Benefits include equity, health, dental and vision coverage, retirement contributions, parental leave, mental-health and wellness benefits, flexible PTO, and a professional-development stipend.

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