Cyber Security Architect - Remote - 6+ Month Contract

We are hiring a Cybersecurity Architect for a fully remote role within a regulated wealth management/services company. You will work alongside Enterprise Platform Architects, engineering teams, data leaders and business stakeholders to make sure enterprise platforms are designed and implemented securely, from early design review through to production readiness. The role covers security architecture across Microsoft Azure, enterprise applications, APIs, integration services and data platforms. Day to day, that includes defining secure patterns for identity, networking, encryption, secrets, logging and resilience, applying Zero Trust principles across workforce and workload access, and leading threat modeling and architecture risk assessments. You will also produce reusable blueprints, policy-as-code, IaC modules and implementation guidance that engineering teams can adopt consistently, and take part in architecture review forums. A significant part of the role is establishing guardrails for generative AI, agents and models. This includes AI gateways, model access controls, prompt and output protections, RAG and vector store security, tool invocation, MCP-based connectivity, non-human identities, human-in-the-loop controls and monitoring. The ideal candidate has cybersecurity experience, with significant responsibility for enterprise, cloud or platform security architecture. Deep Azure experience is required, along with strong knowledge of Entra ID, OAuth/OIDC, conditional access and privileged access. You should be hands-on enough to review configurations and technical artifacts, and able to communicate risk clearly to engineers, executives and control functions. Experience in wealth management, asset management, or professional services is preferred, as is familiarity with Purview, Sentinel, Defender for Cloud, Azure OpenAI or similar AI platforms, and frameworks such as NIST CSF, NIST AI RMF and ISO 27001. Certifications like CISSP, CCSP or Azure Security Engineer are a plus. Ready to build something that actually matters? Get in touch. This is a fully remote role, but you must live in the United States. They'll need someone who's fully authorized to work in the US without any sponsorship / visa ( cannot support H-1B visa ).