This role pays more than
85%
of similar roles. Most pay
$174,600–$225,000
— the shaded band above.
At the midpoint, this role pays about
$231k
versus about
$200k
for comparable roles.
Based on 240 similar postings.
Employer
About Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is a global technology leader producing software, hardware, and cloud services including Windows, Office 365, Azure cloud platform, Xbox gaming, and Surface devices. Industry: Software & Cloud Computing
Microsoft currently has
598 open roles
on FindRole.
Listed pay typically runs
$119,800–$234,700
across 586 roles with salary data.
As a Principal Software Engineer on the MSC Security Fundamentals team, you will design and build scalable, resilient distributed services that form the security foundation of the cloud platform. You will architect sovereign security solutions to address critical requirements such as data residency, regulatory compliance, and isolation guarantees while navigating complex, ambiguous problem spaces. Your daily work involves making high-impact architectural decisions, driving cross-organization integration across Microsoft Security and Azure teams, and ensuring live site readiness through monitoring and performance optimization. The role requires expertise in distributed systems concepts like concurrency and consensus algorithms, as well as experience with microservices architecture. You will utilize programming languages including C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, Python, or Go to develop secure software systems featuring robust authentication and data protection for sovereign and commercial cloud environments.
What does a Software Engineer earn?
Median $197500 from 2196 postings across 133 companies.
Design and drive architecture for security services meeting sovereign cloud requirements like data residency and regulatory compliance.
Develop distributed cloud services that are reliable, performant, and maintainable at a global scale.
Navigate complex, undefined problem spaces to identify technical approaches and evaluate emerging technologies.
Integrate live site readiness, monitoring, incident response, and performance optimization into the development lifecycle.
Champion engineering best practices, clean code, and modern development standards across the team.
Act as a technical leader to mentor senior engineers and shape the technical culture of the organization.
What we're looking for
Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science or related technical field and 8+ years of engineering experience in languages like C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, or Python.
Master's Degree in Computer Science or related field with 12+ years of experience, or a Bachelor's Degree with 15+ years of equivalent experience.
8+ years of experience designing and operating scalable, highly available cloud services or distributed systems on Azure with production ownership.
8+ years of experience applying distributed systems concepts like concurrency, conflict resolution, and consensus algorithms to build resilient back-end architectures.
8+ years of experience developing secure software systems involving authentication, data protection, access control, and secure coding practices.
5+ years of experience designing and building solutions using microservices architecture with production ownership.
Experience with sovereign cloud, data residency, or regulatory compliance requirements in cloud platform engineering.
Verification of U.S. citizenship is required to meet export control regulations and support government agency customers.
Python
C#
Java
Go
C++
C
JavaScript
SQL
Azure
AWS
GCP
Distributed Systems
Data Pipelines
CI/CD
Backend Services
data-processing
System Design
Monitoring
Alerting
Analytics
Python
Java
Go
C++
C
JavaScript
Azure
AWS
GCP
Distributed Systems
CI/CD
Kusto
Azure Data Explorer
Spark
Data Processing
Security Engineering
Telemetry
Monitoring
Performance Optimization