Staff Backend Engineer, Passwordless

The Staff Software Engineer Opportunity

Passkeys, powered by FIDO2 WebAuthn, are revolutionizing how people authenticate—bringing us into a passwordless future that’s more secure and seamless than ever before.At Okta, we’re on a mission to help enterprises and consumers embrace this transformation. We’re building cutting-edge phishing-resistant authenticators and passkey solutions that make security stronger while making life easier for users. Our products empower businesses to leave passwords behind and defend against modern threats with innovative, user-friendly technology.

We are looking for a Staff Software Engineer to join the Passwordless team. As a Staff Engineer, you will be a technical leader, making large, independent contributions and shaping the future of how millions of users access technology securely.

This is a role for an engineer who thrives on solving ambiguous problems and taking ownership of end-to-end solutions. You will not only execute on complex technical challenges but also influence the team's direction, mentor other engineers, and proactively identify opportunities to improve our products and processes. If you are passionate about building highly reliable, scalable systems and want to define the future of passwordless authentication, we’d love for you to join us.

What you’ll be doing

• Partner closely with product, design, and other cross-functional stakeholders to own problem spaces and ensure we are building the right solutions for our customers.
• Independently own and deliver major features from conception and design through to deployment and monitoring, tackling ambiguous problems along the way.
• Act as a technical leader within the team, driving design discussions, influencing the roadmap, and making strategic trade-offs that improve team velocity and product health.
• Mentor other engineers through code reviews, knowledge sharing, and by setting an example of engineering craft and operational excellence.
• Champion a data-driven culture by leveraging telemetry and observability tools to troubleshoot complex production incidents and guide technical decisions.

What you’ll bring to the role

• 8+ years of professional software development experience, with a demonstrated history of technical leadership and mentorship.
• Deep expertise in Java, including a strong understanding of object-oriented design, multithreading, and building high-performance services.
• Proven experience designing, building, and operating complex, large-scale distributed systems in a cloud environment (e.g., AWS, GCP, Azure).
• A strong grasp of architectural patterns for scalability, reliability, and security, with the ability to lead technical design discussions and make informed trade-offs.
• Excellent problem-solving skills, with the ability to independently debug and remediate issues in complex, unfamiliar codebases and systems.
• A proactive and ownership-driven mindset, with the ability to manage your own priorities and spot areas for future work.
• Strong communication and collaboration skills, with a history of working effectively with cross-functional teams to deliver impactful products.
• Deep knowledge of phishing-resistant authentication methods, including Passkeys, FIDO2, or WebAuthn.
• Experience in identity and access management (IAM), including protocols like OAuth, OIDC, and SAML.

And extra credit if you have experience in any of the following!

• Experience with modern frontend frameworks (e.g., React, Angular, Vue.js) is a plus.

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