Ascension LLC is seeking a Cloud/Security Engineer to support a mission-critical public sector technology initiative for the Maryland Department of Labor. This role will help safeguard a secure, scalable, and privacy-conscious SaaS environment supporting loan application intake, eligibility review, identity verification, payment data exchange, repayment tracking, reporting, customer support workflows, and audit-ready data management.

The ideal candidate is a hands-on cloud and security professional with strong experience supporting secure SaaS platforms, cloud hosting environments, encrypted file transfer, identity and access controls, privacy protections, and compliance-driven system operations. This role is well-suited for a detail-oriented engineer who understands that security is not a back-office function. It is central to public trust, applicant confidence, data integrity, and successful program performance.

Ascension is looking for a candidate who can work effectively in a fast-moving implementation environment, collaborate with software engineers, project managers, customer support teams, data/reporting specialists, and State stakeholders, and translate security requirements into practical technical controls. The selected candidate must be comfortable supporting systems that process sensitive applicant information, identity documents, tax-related data, banking/repayment information, and audit records.

Summary of the Contractor Role

The Cloud/Security Engineer will support the design, configuration, monitoring, and continuous improvement of the secure cloud and application environment used to operate the Federal Worker Loan Program. The role will help ensure that the platform protects applicant data, supports secure identity verification, enables encrypted file transfer with State systems, maintains appropriate access controls, and aligns with applicable security, privacy, accessibility, AI governance, and data handling requirements.

This position will support cloud security architecture, secure configuration management, encryption, privacy controls, system monitoring, incident response readiness, vulnerability coordination, audit logging, user access governance, secure integration, and data transfer validation. The role will also support compliance documentation, security testing, background check verification tracking for personnel with access to sensitive data, and coordination with MD Labor and State stakeholders regarding security and data protection expectations.

The successful candidate should be self-driven, organized, risk-aware, and capable of operating with minimal supervision. They should be able to anticipate security and privacy issues before they become operational risks, document technical decisions clearly, and help the project team balance program speed with strong governance and system integrity.

Position’s Day-to-Day Activities Expected or Anticipated

The Cloud/Security Engineer will be expected to:

• Configure secure cloud hosting environments, access controls, storage, encryption, monitoring, and logging capabilities for the SaaS solution.
• Implement security controls that support protection of sensitive applicant information, identity documents, tax-related verification data, payment data, repayment records, and audit logs.
• Support compliance with State security, privacy, responsible AI, data classification, digital accessibility, and secure file transfer requirements.
• Administer identity and access management controls, including user roles, least privilege access, privileged account management, and periodic access reviews.
• Validate secure file transfer processes using SFTP or other State-approved secure transmission methods for eligibility, payment, repayment, reconciliation, and reporting files.
• Monitor system security events, access logs, transmission reports, and exception activity to identify potential risks or suspicious behavior.
• Coordinate vulnerability management activities, including scan review, remediation tracking, patch coordination, and security configuration updates.
• Support secure integrations with identity verification tools, payment processing channels, State-approved systems, ticketing platforms, reporting tools, and data export functions.
• Document cloud architecture, data flows, security controls, encryption methods, access permissions, incident response procedures, and system dependencies.
• Participate in user acceptance testing, security testing, data validation, and production readiness reviews prior to launch.
• Assist with implementation of AI governance safeguards, including monitoring, guardrails, auditability, and expert review provisions for AI-enabled features.
• Develop and maintain incident response support materials, escalation procedures, security checklists, and remediation workflows.
• Verify that system audit logs, timestamps, schema, and data exports are available to support MD Labor audit, archival, and close-out requirements.
• Coordinate with project managers, developers, data analysts, customer support leads, and State stakeholders to resolve technical risks and security issues.
• Support background check compliance tracking for personnel requiring access to sensitive State data, including documentation of completion prior to assignment.
• Prepare security-related status updates, risk summaries, technical notes, and recommendations for project leadership and customer stakeholders.