Frontier Security Researcher/Senior Researcher

Apply by September 8th, 23:59 PDT.

If you have any issues applying, please email careers@iaps.ai.

This is a closed hiring round — please share directly with strong potential candidates rather than posting publicly. If you have any issues applying, please email careers@iaps.ai.

Key Information

• Role: Researcher OR Senior Researcher - Frontier Security

• Salary: $71,000 – $200,000 USD annually (pre-tax)

  • Researcher: $71,000 – $100,000 USD

  • Senior Researcher: $101,000 – $200,000 USD

  • Benefits include healthcare, retirement, and >$10k/year support budgets.

• Location: Remote (we are able to hire in most countries), with a preference for candidates who are based in, or would be willing to relocate to Washington, D.C.

• Job type: One-year, full-time contract, with the potential to become permanent depending on performance and organizational need. Permanent employment may be negotiable from the start for exceptional candidates — please flag in your application if this is a requirement for you.

• Start date: As soon as possible, but we are open to later start dates. We aim to make decisions by early October.

• Application deadline: Tuesday, September 8th, at the end of the day (23:59) PDT.

• Contact: Please email careers@iaps.ai if you have any questions about logistics or the hiring process. Please email brianna@iaps.aiand nick@iaps.ai for questions about the substance of the role.

About IAPS

The Institute for AI Policy and Strategy (IAPS) is a nonpartisan think tank that produces forward-looking policy research to address the implications of advanced artificial intelligence, from today’s frontier models to potential AGI and beyond. Our work equips policymakers and industry leaders to protect innovation while navigating high-magnitude risks and opportunities at the intersection of AI, national security, and geopolitics.

Our work includes:

• Conducting forward-looking policy research in areas including preparedness, information and supply chain security, and international coordination needed to navigate strategic competition with adversaries who may misuse AI.

• Cultivating policy talent — IAPS is forging a community of researchers and practitioners from across many policy areas and backgrounds to meet this critical moment.

• Providing relevant and timely insights to stakeholders across Congress, the executive branch, industry, academia, and civil society.

Follow these links to read more about our work and our team, and sign up to our newsletter.

About the Role

IAPS's Frontier Security team works to reduce the most consequential risks that arise as increasingly capable AI systems are integrated into national security ecosystems and other high-consequence environments. Our focus is on ensuring that governments, developers, and other organizations retain meaningful oversight and control as frontier AI capabilities advance and deployment accelerates. The team currently works across three workstreams: cyber autonomy; defense and public-private partnerships; and preparedness and incident response.

We are hiring up to two researchers to strengthen the team across this portfolio. We are looking for strong frontier-AI-governance generalists: people with the technical depth and strategic intuition to reason about catastrophic risks from advanced AI — including loss of control, adversarial misuse, strategic instability, concentration of power, and institutional failure — and to turn that analysis into grounded policy research to inform stakeholders across the U.S. government and frontier labs. You do not need a national security background; we value fluency in frontier AI governance and technical AI safety concepts more highly than specific domain experience. That said, we'd be especially excited about candidates interested in contributing to our defense, autonomous cyber agents, and pacing workstreams.

Researchers at IAPS generally own their own projects, working on both deep research projects and rapid-response deliverables in response to stakeholder requests. There is significant scope to collaborate with colleagues or other organizations, and to mentor fellows. For this role, we are particularly looking for candidates who can own project delivery end-to-end — scoping priority projects, managing them to completion, and helping shape workstream direction — with the degree of ownership scaling with seniority.

What We Are Looking For

A wide range of skills and domain expertise are relevant to this work. The most important qualities include:

• The ability to reason rigorously about catastrophic risks from advanced AI, and to back-chain from threat models to concrete, actionable policies. 

• Technical fluency in AI safety and frontier AI systems (e.g., AI control, evaluations, agentic systems, alignment), or the demonstrated ability to get up to speed quickly in new, complex technical domains.

• Strategic intuition: good judgment about which problems matter most, which interventions are tractable, and how to prioritize across them.

• The ability to write quickly, clearly, and with high reasoning transparency.

• The ability to own research delivery: scoping, project management, and follow-through with limited supervision.

Specific areas of expertise that would be valuable:

• Technical AI safety topics such as AI control, evaluations, and monitoring of agentic systems.

• U.S. defense and intelligence institutions, doctrine, and acquisition/procurement processes.

• Offensive and defensive cyber operations, especially AI-enabled or autonomous cyber capabilities.

• Command and control, autonomous systems, and human-machine teaming.

• Escalation dynamics, crisis stability, and strategic stability analysis.

• Public-private partnerships and government relationships with frontier AI developers.

• General AI safety policy and AI strategy/macrostrategy.

What We Offer

Compensation

• Annual salary within the following ranges for a full-time position, prorated for part-time work: $71,000 – $200,000 USD annually (pre-tax)

  • Researcher: $71,000 – $100,000 USD

  • Senior Researcher: $101,000 – $200,000 USD

• We are open to hiring at either seniority level; there is scope for the title to be Researcher or Senior Researcher.

• Compensation is paid in your local currency. For example, if you are a UK resident, we would pay the equivalent to the amounts above but in GBP. We use a set methodology to determine conversion rates, which are reviewed regularly.

• The exact salary will be based on the candidate's prior relevant experience and location (candidates in Washington, D.C., London, and San Francisco will receive relatively higher salaries).

Other Benefits 

• Comprehensive global benefits package, including statutory benefits specific to a local country,

• Generous paid time off (PTO), prorated to the contract duration, and unpaid leave, including:

  • Statutory paid and unpaid leave (as applicable)

    • (If offered a permanent role) Parental leave: up to 6-9 months of a combination of paid and unpaid leave that can be taken within the first 2 years after a child’s birth or adoption.

  • Unlimited (within reason) personal and sick paid and unpaid leave

  • Mid- and end-year, organization-wide breaks (if the employment contract falls within the break timeline)

• Annual technology stipend equivalent to $670 USD for purchasing work and office equipment (if offered a permanent role, this amount would be increased to $2,000 USD that renews every 3 years)

• Coworking support (including in-person desk space in our hub locations) and AI tools budget to help you be your most productive self. 

• Annual team retreat and other potential opportunities for paid travel.

• We encourage proactive professional development and offer learning opportunities, including conferences, workshops, training, and professional certifications.

Role Logistics and Additional Information

• Location: This role is fully remote, with a preference for candidates who are based in, or would be willing to relocate to, Washington, D.C. We are able to legally hire in most countries. We offer a 10% location bonus for candidates based in Washington D.C. and San Francisco, and a 5% location bonus for candidates based in London. These location-based adjustments reflect the added value of in-person stakeholder outreach in these locations of interest to our organization. If you have questions about whether we can hire you in a specific country and if this will influence your decision about applying, please contact careers@iaps.ai before submitting your application.

• Time zone: While we welcome applicants from all time zones, you may be expected to attend meetings during working hours between UTC-8 and UTC+3 time zones, where most of our staff are based. Depending on your personal timezone, this might mean early morning or evening calls; however, you would not be required to attend calls outside of waking hours.

• Hours: We seek candidates who can commit to full-time work of 40 hours per week. 

• Travel: This role has opportunities for business travel. However, all travel is optional and travel is not required to take this position. Trips are fully paid and may involve visits to Washington D.C., San Francisco, or London, one team retreat annually, and relevant conferences.

• Extension Requests: We will try to accommodate extension requests that are made before the deadline and are for up to three days. We generally cannot accommodate extension requests made on or after the application deadline, or are longer than three days, and cannot accept late submissions to ensure fairness to other applicants.

• Language: Please submit all of your application materials in English and note that we require professional level English proficiency.

• Accessibility: We're committed to running an inclusive and accessible hiring process. We warmly invite you to reach out to careers@iaps.ai with any accommodation requests.

• Inclusivity: IAPS is committed to building an inclusive, equitable, and supportive community. We encourage applications from candidates of all backgrounds and identities.

• Hiring emails: Please add careers@iaps.ai to your trusted contacts and/or check your 'spam', 'promotions', and 'updates' folders if you don't hear from us within the expected timeframe. 

Our Hiring Process

We are running an expedited process for this hiring round. It will include a structured interview and a reference check, and may include a paid skills assessment. All applicants will hear from us about their application, and we will confirm the details of each stage with you in advance.

To apply, please click the 'Apply Now' button below.

Note Before Applying: Please do not include a cover letter, photograph, or headshot of yourself, or any personal information that is not relevant to the role for which you're applying (including marital status, age, identity traits, etc.). Additionally, please do not ask our staff members involved in the hiring process to meet with you. To ensure fairness, we try to minimize these interactions, and requests for meetings with the hiring committee members during the process will be declined.

Contact: Please email careers@iaps.ai if you have any questions.