IT Security Architect

Position: IT Security Architect

Group: Information Technology

Primary Job Purpose

The Jobholder is responsible in designing, implementing, and managing secure technology architectures within the bank's IT systems. He/ she will ensure the integration of security principles across IT projects and collaborates closely with IT Security Operations (SOC) to align with operational security needs.

The job holder must therefore have extensive skills, knowledge and understanding of the related technologies and solutions together with their implications, and is expected to analyse, address, track and successfully resolve requests and issues within the area of responsibility, and help ensure the implemented solutions meet the service quality, security and performance benchmarks, and that the delivery is on time and within budget.

Job Roles & Responsibilities:

Strategy, Planning and Management

Planning and Management

• Develop and maintain the IT security architecture roadmap aligned with the overall Enterprise Architecture strategy and business goals.
• Develop, implement, and enforce technical security architecture standards and policies.
• Define security specifications for new technology implementations.
• Ensure security architecture designs align with IT demand, change, and overall enterprise architecture goals.
• Ensure security is embedded in IT system designs from initiation, leveraging industry best practices and frameworks.
• Act as a liaison between IT SOC, application owners, infrastructure teams, and third-party technology providers to ensure security design consistency.
• Assist in developing security policies and procedures.
• Ensure security architecture aligned with Enterprise Architecture (EA) standards are part of EA standard tool (Software AG ALFABET).

Operations, Review and Reporting

Understanding

• Maintain updated knowledge of related strategies, frameworks, standards, rules, regulations, and related matters of interest to the department.
• Stay current with emerging security trends, technologies, and frameworks (e.g. ISO 27001) to enhance security architecture design.

Fieldwork

• Design secure technology solutions for infrastructure, applications, and platforms to ensure confidentiality, integrity, and availability.
• Embed security controls into system architecture to protect sensitive assets.
• Identify and address potential vulnerabilities during the architecture design stage.
• Provide architectural guidance for SOC tools and processes, ensuring compatibility with enterprise-wide systems.
• Support IT SOC in reviewing and integrating security monitoring and logging capabilities within the IT infrastructure.
• Conduct security design reviews for IT applications, cloud platforms, and infrastructure.
• Perform security assessments and gap analysis on existing IT systems, recommending improvements for secure design and risk mitigation.

Review and Monitoring

• Review, monitor and provide security architecture requirements for change initiatives and technology upgrades.
• Monitor compliance against elective as well as mandatory regulatory

Reporting

• Generate and circulate scheduled periodic and requested ad-hoc reports ensuring their accuracy and timely delivery

Stakeholder Management

Internal Interactions

• Participate in the various cross-functional committees/teams for multiple purposes to achieve optimal cooperation and seamless quality service.
• Work closely with the IT Security Operations (SOC) team to implement technical security controls and support threat detection, incident response, and vulnerability management.
• Collaboration with other departments like Information Security / Risk Management and Compliance.

External Representation

• Maintain continuous interaction, coordination and collaboration with external IT System and Service Suppliers on Architecture matters

Job Specifications

E ducational Qualification(s)

• Bachelor’s degree or equivalent in a related field

Experience

• Minimum years of related experience required:
• Manager: 7 years
• Extensive experience in infrastructure security, cloud security, identity and access management, and data protection technologies. including knowledge of related tools, concepts and methodologies and relevant requirements preferably in a bank or a financial institution.
• Proficient in data protection through encryption technologies (e.g., AES, RSA) and Data Loss Prevention (DLP) solutions such as Symantec DLP and Forcepoint.

Certification(s)

• IT Architecture and Service Management related training / certifications

Security Certifications

Language(s) known

• English (Proficient)
• Arabic (Proficient)