About the job

Job summary

The NCA has grown in size and complexity in recent years and it is vital that it maintains a security posture and capabilities to protect against existing, new and emerging threats. 

The Integrated Protective Security Command (IPS) is responsible for securing the Agency to protect the public. The IPS mission statement is:
"Delivering integrated protective security to build a resilient, high-trust Agency able to lead the UK’s fight to cut serious and organised crime."

IPS safeguards the NCA from the full range of security threats that target the Agency, our officers and our assets, to enable the organisation to achieve its operational objectives, both domestically and overseas, with flexibility, agility and integrity. Its officers provide specialist security services to the Agency 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, to mitigate security risks.

Job description

We are currently looking to recruit a SOC Engineer to join our Cyber Security Team within the Integrated  protective security command. The successful candidate will be based at the Agency’s Birmingham office, but will have the opportunity to travel within the UK to gain network experience. 

The Cyber Security Team leads the strategic response to cyber risks, cyber defence and assurance of the Agency’s IT platforms. 

What will the successful Candidate be doing?

If successful you will work within the newly created Security Operations Centre, supporting the SOC Analysts to keep all SOC services running smoothly whilst identifying and implementing continual service improvements. Joining at this time offers the rare opportunity to help shape what the final SOC capability will look like.

Reporting to the SOC Manager, The SOC Engineer supports the SOC capability by ensuring that extant security technologies, such as SIEM, IPS and boundary firewalls are managed, configured and maintained to meet both system and service requirements (such as SLAs, KPIs, and availability targets). The successful candidate will be dedicated to learning about the hardware and software that underpins the SOC services, leveraging previous experience in managing and maintaining similar security technologies in a Secure Operations environment. In order to best understand the platforms you will help protect, you will spend time on-site at Birmingham with the Analysts, as well as travelling the UK working alongside experienced engineers from DDaT.

**To be considered, you will need to successfully complete SC Enhanced clearance before commencing the role and achieve DV clearance within the first 12 months in post.**

Person specification

Responsibilities

Responsibilities will include, but not be limited to: 

• Deployment, configuration and management of security technologies, including but not limited to SIEM, IPS and boundary Firewalls.
• Ensuring that the implementation and delivery of security technologies meets ongoing service delivery, security, compliance and performance requirements.
• Troubleshoot and diagnose infrastructure and application problems and be responsible for their resolution.
• Maintain an update/patching schedule, performing application updates across all security technologies in scope.
• Implement agreed changes to the SIEM (e.g. data source on-boarding, off-boarding and tuning. Administration of joiners, movers, leavers processes and role based access control for SOC user groups).
• Implement agreed changes to Boundary firewall and IPS technologies (e.g, the creation, modification of preventative controls.)
• Working collaboratively alongside the security analysts to ensure SIEM security rules and underlying data ingestion mechanisms are operating effectively and efficiently.
• Perform the creation, management and maintenance of bespoke connectors and parsing rules, to ensure current and future in-scope data sources can be ingested into the SIEM.
• Working collaboratively alongside the security analyst team in order to create and maintain reporting, analytics and dashboard capabilities across security tooling.
• Assist with the analysis of security-related events and incidents identified by the SOC analysts. Play an active role in the identification and swift execution of remedial actions, including but not limited to, parsing rule creation and tuning, applying emergency patches, and the application of additional IPS/firewall preventative controls.
• Establish and maintain configuration baselines, adhere to configuration control and perform system testing to ensure adequate governance is applied, minimising service impact.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £41,347, National Crime Agency contributes £11,163 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

Things you need to know

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window), and will assess your Behaviours, Experience and Technical skills.

If you wish to apply for this vacancy, you must submit your application by 23:55 on Sunday 21st July 2024.

You will be asked to complete a CV as part of the application process. Your CV should set out your career history including training and qualifications, with key responsibilities and achievements. Please ensure that each entry of your career history also has a few sentences outlining a description and the key elements of that role, and that you provide reasons for any gaps within the last two years. Please ensure the dates of any accreditations you are relying on are entered onto the CV. 

• CV which will assess the following criteria; 'Experience in a application/software support role and the deployment configuration/management of security technologies.'

For further application guidance please visit https://www.nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk/careers/applying-and-onboarding

Once submitted your application will be acknowledged by the Government Recruitment Service.

A panel will then assess your application to select those demonstrating the best fit for the role by considering the evidence you have provided against the criteria set out in the Entry Criteria section.

Failure to address any or all of these may affect your application.

Sift results are expected to be released w/c Monday 12th August 2024.

Interview Details 

You will then be asked to attend an interview in order to have a more in-depth discussion of your previous experience and professional competence. 

There will be one round of interviews which will assess the following criteria;

• 2 x Behaviours as listed in the advert
• 4 x Technical skills as listed in the advert. There will also be a written exercise, further details will be provided to candidates successful at sift. 

Interviews will take place throughout August and September 2024 - locations to be confirmed. Please be advised that the type of interview (eg. virtual/face-to-face) may be subject to change and successful candidates will be notified of this prior to attending. However the interview is conducted, the interview criteria will remain as detailed within this advert.

The above sift and interview dates are an indicative timeline.

Should you be successful at sift but cannot attend on the interview date(s) listed the recruitment team cannot guarantee an alternative date. Please contact the recruitment team.

Full details of the assessment process will be made available to shortlisted candidates.

Please ensure that all examples provided in your application are taken directly from your own experience and that you describe the examples in your own words. Any instances of plagiarism including copying of examples/answers from internet sources will result in a withdrawal of your application. Further action, including disciplinary action, may be considered in such cases involving internal candidates. Providing false or misleading information would be contrary to the core values of honesty and integrity expected of all Civil Servants.

Interview Outcome 

Candidates will be alerted of the outcome of their interview via their CS Jobs Portal.  We will be retaining a candidate pool of successful applicants to draw from as vacancies arise for up to 12 months.

If your application is successful and we are unable to offer you a post immediately, you will be invited to join our reserve list. If over the next 12 months we are able to offer you a position, we will contact you as soon as possible. 

Once we make you an offer you will then go through our vetting and pre-employment checks processes.

All Appointments will be made in location merit order. 

Multi-Location

Where more than one location is advertised, candidates will be appointed in merit order for each location. You will be asked to state your location preference on your application.

Please be aware that you can be posted to any location that you put in your preferences. If you would only like to be posted to one location, please confirm one location only. If you are posted to a location that you have requested and you do not accept that location, you may not be offered another role.

Please note, only advertised location can be offered. Notes populated in a free text box will not be taken into consideration.

Near Miss 

If you are not found appointable at the advertised grade you may be offered the lower grade role if you are considered to meet the skills, experience and behaviours for the lower level. The benchmark for appointing to the lower grade is set at the start of each campaign. All offers will be made in merit.

If you are found appointable at the higher grade but there are no positions available you may be offered an appointment at the lower grade.

Hybrid Working

Here at the NCA we have a hybrid working arrangement in place enabling officers to work a proportion of their role remotely. Eligibility and the degree of home working will vary depending on the requirements of the role. Further details can be discussed at offer stage.

Reasonable Adjustment

We are committed to ensuring our recruitment process is inclusive and accessible to all. As part of our application process you will be prompted to provide details of any reasonable adjustment to our recruitment process that you may need. If you have a disability or long-term condition (a physical or mental impairment that has a substantial and long term effect on your ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities, we have a duty to make reasonable changes to our processes.

If you need a change to be made so that you can make your application, you should: Contact Government Recruitment Service via ncarecruitment.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk as soon as possible before the closing date to discuss your needs. Complete the ‘Assistance required’ section in the ‘Additional requirements’ page of your application form to tell us what changes or help you might need further on in the recruitment process. For instance, you may need wheelchair access at interview, or if you’re deaf, a Language Service Professional.

Inclusion and Accessibility

We are proud to be an inclusive, equal opportunities employer. As a Disability Confident Leader we are committed to ensuring that all candidates are treated fairly throughout the recruitment process. For details of the available group please visit https://www.nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk/careers/benefits-and-support

In order to monitor the effectiveness of the National Crime Agency’s Diversity & Inclusion strategy, the NCA require certain personal details about you on submission of your application. Please note that this will be treated in confidence and will not impact your application. You will be asked to complete an E-consent survey asking for permission to share this data with the NCA to be used for statistical/monitoring purposes only, refusal of consent to share the information will not impact your application.

If you are experiencing accessibility problems with any attachments on this advert, please contact ncarecruitment.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk

Additional Information 

• The NCA is a 24/7 organisation, and working patterns must support business requirements. Some roles may require you to respond at short notice or outside of core hours.
• Individuals will be required to undertake and pass a substance misuse test as part of pre-employment checks.
• Successful candidates may be required to undertake a medical. If required, the medical will take place in either London or Warrington. Unfortunately, travel costs will not be reimbursed.
• If you are an internal candidate who has passed interview but is undergoing an internal investigation or have a written warning in place preventing a post move you may not be able to be posted until this investigation is concluded or restriction lifted. You will remain on the reserve list for a max of 12 months

VETTING REQUIREMENTS SC

All security clearances require you to provide evidence of your UK footprint where you have been physically present in the UK.

The requirement for SC clearance is to have been present in the UK for at least 3 of the last 5 years.

Failure to meet the residency requirements will result in your security clearance application being rejected.

If you require SC clearance you will need to provide evidence of the below requirements.

Checks will be made against:

• Departmental or company records (personnel files, staff reports, sick leave reports and security records)
• UK criminal records covering both spent and unspent criminal records
• Your credit and financial history with a credit reference agency
• Security Services records

VETTING REQUIREMENTS - DV

All security clearances require you to provide evidence of your UK footprint where you have been physically present in the UK.

The requirement for DV is to have been present in the UK for at least 7 of the last 10 years.

Failure to meet the residency requirements will result in your security clearance application being rejected.

If you require DV clearance you will need to provide evidence of the below requirements.

Checks will be made against:

• successful completion of the BPSS
• UK criminal record and identity checks
• credit reference checks
• relevant personnel and medical checks (if required)

For further information on National Security Vetting please visit the following page https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/demystifying-vetting

We encourage all candidates to visit the NCA careers page for further information please visit https://www.nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk/careers

If you have any specific queries about the role that are not covered above please contact:  ncarecruitment.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check (opens in a new window).

See our vetting charter (opens in a new window). People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window). The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria. The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.