Software Engineer, Privacy Engineering (Lawful Access)

Details

About the Team

The Privacy Engineering team builds secure, reliable systems that help OpenAI meet its legal obligations while protecting user data. We partner closely with Legal and engineering teams across OpenAI to support lawful data access requests and other critical legal workflows. Our work turns complex, high-stakes processes into auditable and dependable technical systems with clear human oversight and strong privacy and security controls.

About the Role

We’re looking for a full-stack Software Engineer to build the internal tools and data pipelines that power lawful data access request workflows and Legal Operations. You will work across product and data systems to make authorized retrieval and case handling accurate, efficient, and auditable. This role is well suited to someone who enjoys translating ambiguous operational requirements into durable systems, cares deeply about sensitive-data handling, and wants to improve both technical reliability and the day-to-day experience of the people operating these workflows.

Responsibilities

• Design, build, and operate backend systems and workflow tooling for the full lifecycle of lawful data access requests, from intake and scoping through authorized retrieval, review, preparation, and audit.
• Build reliable data pipelines and interfaces across products and data stores so authorized teams can locate and handle the right records accurately and reproducibly.
• Implement least-privilege access, approval gates, provenance, audit trails, data minimization, and safe failure modes for sensitive workflows.
• Partner with Legal and Legal Operations to translate legal and operational requirements into clear technical designs and intuitive operator experiences.
• Identify responsible automation opportunities that reduce repetitive work while preserving human review, judgment, and accountability.
• Own production systems through testing, observability, incident response, documentation, and continuous reliability improvements.
• Help define the architecture and roadmap for reusable privacy and legal-infrastructure foundations as OpenAI’s products and obligations evolve.

Requirements

You might thrive in this role if you:

• Have experience building or operating systems for lawful data access requests and understand the domain’s legal-process lifecycle, privacy and security constraints, auditability requirements, and operational sensitivities.
• Strong backend engineering fundamentals and experience building production services or data-intensive systems.
• Ability to reason carefully about correctness, authorization, security, and privacy when working with sensitive data.
• A track record of turning ambiguous requirements into pragmatic plans and communicating technical tradeoffs clearly.
• End-to-end ownership, including operating what you build, and comfort learning unfamiliar products and domains.
• Care for operator experience and a drive to make complex workflows safer, clearer, and more efficient.
• Experience collaborating across Engineering, Legal, operations, Privacy, and Security stakeholders.

Benefits

• Medical, dental, and vision insurance for you and your family, with employer contributions to Health Savings Accounts
• Pre-tax accounts for Health FSA, Dependent Care FSA, and commuter expenses (parking and transit)
• 401(k) retirement plan with employer match
• Paid parental leave (up to 24 weeks for birth parents and 20 weeks for non-birthing parents), plus paid medical and caregiver leave (up to 8 weeks)
• Paid time off: flexible PTO for exempt employees and up to 15 days annually for non-exempt employees
• 13+ paid company holidays, and multiple paid coordinated company office closures throughout the year for focus and recharge, plus paid sick or safe time (1 hour per 30 hours worked, or more, as required by applicable state or local law)
• Mental health and wellness support
• Employer-paid basic life and disability coverage
• Annual learning and development stipend to fuel your professional growth
• Daily meals in our offices, and meal delivery credits as eligible
• Relocation support for eligible employees
• Additional taxable fringe benefits, such as charitable donation matching and wellness stipends, may also be provided

More details about our benefits are available to candidates during the hiring process.

This role is at-will and OpenAI reserves the right to modify base pay and other compensation components at any time based on individual performance, team or company results, or market conditions.