Senior ELK Stack Engineer (SIEM & Security Platform) Contract

Role: Senior ELK Stack Engineer (SIEM & Security Platform)

Location: Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Engagement: Contractual

Duration: 12 Months (Extendable, Long-term with Marc Ellis)

 

Job Summary:

 

We are seeking an experienced Senior ELK Stack Engineer to manage, develop, and enhance our enterprise Elastic Stack platform, which serves as the organization’s SIEM solution. This role combines hands-on development, platform administration, system integration, security hardening, and operational support to ensure high availability, performance, and regulatory compliance within a high-threat financial environment requiring robust and proven security controls to protect sensitive data and systems.

 

Education & Experience:

• IT-based degree or University qualification in Computer Science, Information Technology, or a related discipline (or equivalent practical experience)
• Minimum 8 years of overall IT experience, preferably within enterprise or banking environments
• At least 3 years of hands-on experience architecting, designing, developing, and supporting ELK (Elasticsearch, Logstash, Kibana) platforms
• Proven experience managing and supporting enterprise monitoring or SIEM platforms within complex, production-grade environments
• Very good knowledge of banking IT systems, applications, and production environments

Key Responsibilities:

 

ELK Platform Management & Administration

• Install, configure, upgrade, and maintain Elasticsearch, Logstash, Kibana, and X-Pack components.
• Manage Elastic 8.x environments across Dev, Test, and Production, ensuring high availability and performance tuning.
• Perform cluster scaling, capacity planning, and version management.
• Deploy and manage Elastic clusters using Infrastructure as Code (e.g., Ansible).
• Configure and maintain Linux-based systems supporting the Elastic platform.
• Integrate Elastic Stack with third-party systems via APIs and web services.
• Follow SDLC processes and maintain documentation for deployment and production support.
• Provide break-fix support, patching, upgrades, and participate in 24×7 on-call support while ensuring SLA/OLA adherence.

SIEM & Security Operations

• Manage and enhance the ELK platform utilized as the organization’s SIEM solution.
• Develop and maintain log ingestion pipelines for SIEM, application, and APM logs.
• Perform log parsing and normalization using Logstash (grok filters).
• Implement and maintain security configurations including TLS, certificates, encryption, RBAC, and X-Pack features.
• Support vulnerability management and ensure timely application of security updates.
• Develop security dashboards, alerts, and reporting aligned with operational and compliance requirements.

Technical Skills:

• Strong hands-on experience with Elasticsearch (Elastic 8.x)
• Proficiency in Logstash (including grok parsing and pipeline configuration)
• Strong working knowledge of Kibana (dashboards, visualizations, reporting)
• Experience with X-Pack Security (TLS, certificates, encryption, RBAC)
• Experience implementing and supporting ELK as a SIEM platform
• Solid experience in cluster installation, configuration, upgrades, and patching
• Experience in cluster scaling, capacity planning, and performance tuning
• Strong experience with Linux/Unix administration
• Shell scripting knowledge (Bash preferred)
• Experience integrating ELK with third-party systems via APIs / web services
• Experience deploying Elastic clusters using Infrastructure as Code (e.g., Ansible)
• Strong experience in query development and optimization for large datasets
• Understanding of ITIL processes (Incident, Change, Problem Management)
• Knowledge of banking IT production environments

Behavioral Competencies:

• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills.
• Ability to work under pressure in production environments.
• High integrity and adherence to governance standards.
• Results-oriented with a focus on quality and service delivery.
• Collaborative team player with strong stakeholder coordination skills.