Backend Engineer, Tailscale
Identity
$163-226k
Offers equity
A zero config VPN for building secure networks
Open for applications
A zero config VPN for building secure networks
201-500 employees
Open for applications
$163-226k
Offers equity
201-500 employees
Company mission
To remove overhead and complexity from the “long tail” of software and operational problems that people face every day.
Role
Who you are
- Because we’re an early-stage and fully remote company, we’re looking for a strongly motivated individual who can help move the product forward at crucial intersections of the technology and organization: in this case, the intersection of our backend platform and its various identity, authorization, and authentication needs
- The ability to think on your feet, collaborate with highly technical teams, and comfort working asynchronously are essential
- Familiarity with authentication/authorization protocols, standards and frameworks such as OAuth2, OIDC, SSO, and SAML. Familiarity with SCIM is a plus
- Experience with distributed systems and building observable, secure, scalable, and resilient services
- Most of the non-front-end portions of the system are developed in the Go programming language. Experience with Go is a plus
- Experience with one or more SQL databases
- Ability to give and process constructive feedback, as well as work independently
- Flexibility to adjust to the dynamic nature of a startup
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills
- Familiarity with networks (IP addressing, routing, etc.) is a plus
- Frequently cited statistics show that people who identify with historically marginalized groups are likely to apply to jobs only if they meet 100% of the qualifications. We encourage you to help us break that statistic!
What the job involves
- We’re seeking a skilled and diligent full-time Software Engineer to join our growing team
- Develop the Tailscale product, contributing to both open source client code and related backend services
- Take ownership of the entire product lifecycle, from writing code to product ideation and strategic decision-making
- Work closely with UX/UI designers and product managers to shape features
- Bring a special focus to building features related to identity and access management
- Work as part of a team of engineers to design, build, test, and document core software components
- Develop product features in areas that include our control plane, platform, and identity services
- Develop features that support a broad range of sign-on functionality, such as SSO, OAuth2, SAML, and WebAuthn
- Develop and maintain SCIM style capabilities to synchronize users, groups and other attributes from IdPs
- Exhibit ownership over the running services that comprise Tailscale’s product by building for observability, participating in incident response, and fielding customer support escalations
- Analyze and improve efficiency, scalability, and stability of various system resources
- Bring a security-first mindset to both design and implementation
Our take
The internet is a global phenomenon, but often online activity is unprotected which leaves users vulnerable to hackers on public networks. Additionally certain sites are inaccessible or censored depending on the users location. Use of a VPN enables a secure connection through an encrypted virtual tunnel which also disguises IP addresses. Traditional VPN's tunnel all network traffic through a central gateway server which can affect reliability, and VPN's almost always slow connection speed.
Tailscale is a VPN service built on top of a secure network fabric, which is unlike a traditional VPN provider as it ensures encrypted point-to-point connections by using the open source WireGuard protocol. Tailscale is configured, on average, in a matter of minutes, while other solutions take weeks to fully implement and then require several hours a week of maintenance.
The product has been well received, with reviewers agreeing that it is easy to set up and a great tool for developers. The company plans to develop its product further by tackling the complexity of software and confronting operational problems that people face daily. Off the back of impressive 2025 funding, Tailscale is expanding its engineering, product and sales teams as well as its global reach, all to empower small teams to build systems that scale, without scaling overhead.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
81% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (last 2 of 4 rounds)
Apr 2025
$160m
SERIES C
May 2022
$100m
SERIES B
Total funding: $275m
Company benefits
- Flexible (and reasonable) working hours—work/life balance is exceptionally important to us
- Competitive compensation, stock options and 401(k) (for United States-based employees)
- Comprehensive medical/dental/vision benefits, and more
- 4 weeks of paid vacation (standard across the company) + 12 company holidays per year
- An allowance for equipment to help you personalize your workspace
Company HQ
King West Village, Toronto, ON
Leadership
Avery Pennarun
(Co-Founder & CEO)A range of experience in software engineering including Senior Staff Software Engineer at Google Fiber. They co-founded EQL Data in 2009.
David Crawshaw
(Co-Founder & CTO)Previous experience includes working as a Staff Software Engineer at Google before co-founding Tailscale.
David Carney
(Co-Founder)Co-founded Format in 2012, working as a Full Stack Developer, COO and CFO. Also co-founded Form & Method and The Navarra Group.
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