Head of Security

Head of Security

DeepL

London, Berlin or Munich

Your responsibilities

Strategic Ownership & Leadership

Own the overall Information and IT Security strategy, leading teams responsible for infrastructure security, application security, organisational security, and information governance.

Develop, implement, and maintain robust security frameworks that ensure the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of systems and data across the organization.

Act as the central authority for all security-related initiatives, ensuring alignment with business goals and compliance requirements while being mindful regarding company efficiency.

Governance, Risk & Compliance

Own compliance programs (e.g., SOC 2, ISO 27001, BSI C5).

Shape our approach to risk assessment, third-party risk management, and internal security audits.

Support customer security reviews, RFPs, and due-diligence engagements.

Operational Security & Technology Oversight

Oversee the design, implementation, and continuous improvement of security architecture across IT infrastructure, cloud environments, user devices and SaaS systems.

Ensure secure operations through proactive threat monitoring, vulnerability management, hardening, and incident response training.

Collaborate with engineering teams to integrate security-by-design principles into infrastructure and product development lifecycle.

Collaboration & Stakeholder Management

Partner with Infrastructure, Product teams, People department, Legal, Sales, and other Business leaders to ensure that security and data protection are embedded into all company processes.

Foster a strong security culture through awareness training, communication, and transparent reporting of security metrics and incidents.

Represent the company in security discussions with customers, partners, auditors, and regulators and support sales and customer success teams in high-stakes enterprise deals requiring executive security leadership.

Contribute to board-level reporting on security posture, risk, and investment.

About you

• Proven experience in Security Engineering or Information Security and in leadership roles, ideally as Head of Security, CISO, or equivalent;
• 5+ years in information security;
• Experience in senior leadership roles;
• Experience with IPO readiness, including SOX compliance, and board-level reporting;
• Background in SaaS, AI, or technology sectors;
• Experience building security teams from the ground up and scaling them alongside business growth;
• Strong understanding of technical security domains (network, cloud, endpoint, identity management, incident response) and information security governance;
• Solid knowledge of international and EU compliance frameworks such as ISO 27001, GDPR and SOC2/BSI C5;
• Strategic mindset combined with a hands-on approach to execution;
• Fluent in English, with professional proficiency in German preferred;
• Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills with the ability to bridge technical and business perspectives;
• Strong organisational and leadership skills with a focus on driving measurable outcomes and continuous improvement.

Nice to have

• Experience with AWS Cloud and OnPremise Data Centres;
• First touch with AI/LLM/Agentic security;
• Experience with security tooling and automation platforms (SIEM, SOAR, IAM, etc.);
• Background in rapid growth environments.