Software Engineer - Network Platforms at Cloudflare in Austin, TX

About Us

At Cloudflare, we are on a mission to help build a better Internet. Today the company runs one of the world’s largest networks that powers millions of websites and other Internet properties for customers ranging from individual bloggers to SMBs to Fortune 500 companies. Cloudflare protects and accelerates any Internet application online without adding hardware, installing software, or changing a line of code. Internet properties powered by Cloudflare all have web traffic routed through its intelligent global network, which gets smarter with every request. As a result, they see significant improvement in performance and a decrease in spam and other attacks. Cloudflare was named to Entrepreneur Magazine’s Top Company Cultures list and ranked among the World’s Most Innovative Companies by Fast Company.

At Cloudflare, we’re not looking for people who wait for a polished roadmap; we’re looking for the builders who see the cracks in the Internet that everyone else has simply learned to live with. We value candidates who have the instinct to spot a "normalized" problem and the AI-native curiosity to create a solution using the latest tools. Our culture is built on iteration, leveraging AI to ship faster today to make it better tomorrow, while ensuring that every improvement, no matter how small, is shared across the team to lift everyone up. If you’re the type of person who values curiosity over bureaucracy, and that AI is a partner in solving tough problems to keep the Internet moving forward, you’ll fit right in.

Available Locations: Austin, Texas

About the role

About the team

The Network Platforms team contributes to Traffic Management functions at Cloudflare. One of the multiple teams responsible for the systems that optimize the flow of traffic into, through, and from Cloudflare's global network.

You would be working on the latest Linux network technologies and low level details of the network protocols. The code written would be running on thousands of servers and will be directly impacting each of the packets crossing the network infrastructure, that directly maps to numerous products and millions of customers. These systems are key to Cloudflare's mission to make the internet faster, safer, and more reliable.

Our team at Cloudflare operates under a "Run What You Build" model. This means we are responsible for the health of our systems and actively participate in our team's on-call rotation as part of our operational duties.

What you’ll do

You will build and extend various systems that carry traffic end-to-end on the egress path of Cloudflare network. Starting at the host server linux kernel, with integration towards the network hardware dataplane until the physical Interconnect to an adjacent network. Millions of customers depend on these systems even if not directly visible to them. You'll be solving problems of massive scale and significance, and shaping the future of reliability and performance on the Internet. You will collaborate with engineers across the company, from operations teams to the teams building customer-facing products.

What we are looking for

We are looking for smart, innovative team players that have experience in covering Linux kernel network stack development (particularly with eBPF), complex distributed systems, and understanding of internet protocols and technologies. Particularly, growth-oriented individuals who enjoy being outside of their comfort zones, are comfortable in a fast-paced but sensible work environment and that value and lead with curiosity and empathy.

Role requirements

• Systems-level programming experience in Go, Python, Rust, C, or C++
• A solid grasp of BGP and internet routing.
• Relish opportunities to dive into new technologies, and a demonstrated ability to do so
• Experience in implementing, deploying, and debugging mission-critical distributed systems
• Strong collaboration and communication skills.

Bonus Points

Skills the role requires, we are happy to help you learn on the job.

• Familiarity vendor switching SDKs
• Familiarity with SR-MPLS and sFlow, BGP-LS & PCE protocols
• Experience writing packet-processing software (eg, eBPF at TC or XDP, DPDK)
• Experience participating in an on-call rotation.

What Makes Cloudflare Special?

We’re not just a highly ambitious, large-scale technology company. We’re a highly ambitious, large-scale technology company with a soul. Fundamental to our mission to help build a better Internet is protecting the free and open Internet.

Project Galileo: Since 2014, we've equipped more than 2,400 journalism and civil society organizations in 111 countries with powerful tools to defend themselves against attacks that would otherwise censor their work, technology already used by Cloudflare’s enterprise customers--at no cost.

Athenian Project: In 2017, we created the Athenian Project to ensure that state and local governments have the highest level of protection and reliability for free, so that their constituents have access to election information and voter registration. Since the project, we've provided services to more than 425 local government election websites in 33 states.

1.1.1.1: We released1.1.1.1 to help fix the foundation of the Internet by building a faster, more secure and privacy-centric public DNS resolver. This is available publicly for everyone to use - it is the first consumer-focused service Cloudflare has ever released. Here’s the deal - we don’t store client IP addresses never, ever. We will continue to abide by ourprivacy commitment and ensure that no user data is sold to advertisers or used to target consumers.

Sound like something you’d like to be a part of? We’d love to hear from you!

Please note that applicants who progress to the offer stage of the interview process may be asked to attend an in-person interview within one of the Cloudflare Offices or Cloudflare Hubs. More details about this will be available at that stage of the interview process.

This position may require access to information protected under U.S. export control laws, including the U.S. Export Administration Regulations. Please note that any offer of employment may be conditioned on your authorization to receive software or technology controlled under these U.S. export laws without sponsorship for an export license.

Cloudflare is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We are committed to providing equal employment opportunity for all people and place great value in both diversity and inclusiveness. All qualified applicants will be considered for employment without regard to their, or any other person's, perceived or actual race, color, religion, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, age, physical or mental disability, medical condition, family care status, or any other basis protected by law. We are an AA/Veterans/Disabled Employer.

Cloudflare provides reasonable accommodations to qualified individuals with disabilities. Please tell us if you require a reasonable accommodation to apply for a job. Examples of reasonable accommodations include, but are not limited to, changing the application process, providing documents in an alternate format, using a sign language interpreter, or using specialized equipment. If you require a reasonable accommodation to apply for a job, please contact us via e-mail at hr@cloudflare.com or via mail at 101 Townsend St. San Francisco, CA 94107.