Intermediate Backend Engineer, Authorization

• Extending fine-grained token permissions to more resources, with guidance from senior engineers on the design

What you'll do

• Implement authorization changes in GitLab's Ruby on Rails monolith so permission checks allow intended access and deny unauthorized access.

• Deliver well-scoped workstreams from feature-flagged rollout through verifying that the old and new systems produce the same results, with review and guidance from senior engineers.

• Build and extend fine-grained permissions for tokens and roles so additional resources have permission coverage consistent with the established catalog.

• Extend and fix authorization enforcement so GraphQL and the REST API enforce the intended permissions consistently.

• Make incremental refactors to long-lived policy code without changing behavior for existing customers.

• Investigate and fix reliability, performance, and security issues so affected permission checks return the expected results without regressions.

• Work with the authentication, platform, and artificial intelligence (AI) teams to document interface contracts that keep permission checks consistent as authorization moves toward a shared service.

• Contribute to design documents, merge requests, and code reviews so proposed changes have a documented rationale and review feedback is addressed asynchronously.

• Take part in on-call or operational support where your team’s ownership model requires it.

What you'll bring

• Solid experience building and maintaining production Ruby on Rails applications, typically gained over 2 to 4 years or more.

• Hands-on experience with authorization concepts, such as role-based access control or fine-grained permissions, from work or projects.

• A security mindset: you treat a permission bug as a security bug and consider who a change could affect before choosing an implementation.

• Experience making careful changes to existing codebases, including incremental refactors and feature-flagged rollouts that preserve existing behavior.

• Familiarity with GraphQL or API authorization patterns.

• Awareness of performance, including how repeated permission checks can add up on every request.

• Strong written communication and the ability to work effectively when most decisions happen in a document or merge request rather than a meeting.

• Helpful, but not required: hands-on PostgreSQL experience, or experience with Rust, gRPC or Protocol Buffers, Cedar or other policy languages, Zanzibar-style authorization systems, Go, or service-oriented architecture.

We welcome transferable experience from adjacent domains such as identity, policy engines, and platform security.

About the team

We work in a fully asynchronous organization, with most decisions made in documents or merge requests rather than meetings.

GitLab's mission is to enable everyone to contribute to and co-create the software that powers our world. Our values include collaboration, results, efficiency, diversity, inclusion and belonging, iteration, and transparency. We expect all GitLab team members to incorporate AI into their daily workflows to drive efficiency, innovation, and impact.

How GitLab Supports Full-Time Employees

• Benefits to support your health, finances, and well-being

• Flexible Paid Time Off

• Team Member Resource Groups

• Equity Compensation & Employee Stock Purchase Plan

• Growth and Development Fund

• Parental Leave

Please note that we welcome interest from candidates with varying levels of experience; many successful candidates do not meet every single requirement. Additionally, studies have shown that people from underrepresented groups are less likely to apply to a job unless they meet every single qualification. If you're excited about this role, please apply and allow our recruiters to assess your application.

Country Hiring Guidelines: GitLab hires new team members in countries around the world. All of our roles are remote, however some roles may carry specific location-based eligibility requirements. Our Talent Acquisition team can help answer any questions about location after starting the recruiting process.

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GitLab is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and is an affirmative action employer. GitLab’s policies and practices relating to recruitment, employment, career development and advancement, promotion, and retirement are based solely on merit, regardless of race, color, religion, ancestry, sex (including pregnancy, lactation, sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression), national origin, age, citizenship, marital status, mental or physical disability, genetic information (including family medical history), discharge status from the military, protected veteran status (which includes disabled veterans, recently separated veterans, active duty wartime or campaign badge veterans, and Armed Forces service medal veterans), or any other basis protected by law. GitLab will not tolerate discrimination or harassment based on any of these characteristics. See also GitLab’s EEO Policy and EEO is the Law . If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation , please let us know during the recruiting process .