Jobs in the UK
About the AI Security Institute
The AI Security Institute is the world's largest and best-funded team dedicated to understanding advanced AI risks and translating that knowledge into action. We’re in the heart of the UK government with direct lines to No. 10 (the Prime Minister's office), and we work with frontier developers and governments globally.
We’re here because governments are critical for advanced AI going well, and UK AISI is uniquely positioned to mobilise them. With our resources, unique agility and international influence, this is the best place to shape both AI development and government action.
The deadline for applying to this role is Sunday 29th November 2026, end of day, anywhere on Earth.
About the team
AISI's Technical Standards and Best Practice team identifies what best practice is needed to manage the most serious risks from frontier AI development and leverages AISI’s position to get it adopted.
AI capabilities are advancing faster than the science and practices used to manage their risks. Risks now emerge earlier, during training, internal deployment and evaluation, not just at public release, and evaluation methods are struggling to keep pace. Yet there is no consensus on the set of practices needed to safely use and develop the most capable AI systems, and high-level principles are not enough to manage these risks. What's needed is concrete technical guidance that developers agree is necessary.
AISI is uniquely placed to lead on parts of this industry-wide effort to establish best practice. We house researchers with state-of-the-art technical insight on keeping AI secure during internal use, hold existing relationships with industry and other frontier AI organisations, and offer a neutral third-party home to establish best practice collaboratively. This role directly delivers on part of the Prime Minister’s September 2026 commitment that the UK will work towards principles and standards that ensure the most capable AI systems are developed securely and with appropriate transparency. It builds directly on our October 2026 publication Towards technical best practice for frontier AI development, setting out our view of the most urgent priorities.
This is a new, growing team with high ambitions. It is a cross AISI initiative that draws on and collaborates with researchers and engineers from across AISI's research teams, as well as our Communications, International and Strategy teams. We're now building a dedicated core team and expect it to grow as the work does.
Why this team matters:
AISI is uniquely placed to shape this guidance, and this team is how we'll do it:
- Technical expertise: AISI has roughly 10 technical and research teams whose expertise can be drawn on; one of the largest groups working on AI risk outside the frontier AI companies. AISI has evaluated more than 55 frontier models before release and published research on topics such as safety cases, monitorability and control.
- A research institute within government: we work directly with leading AI developers, other governments, and third-party evaluators, and can bring them together around practices no single company would set on its own. UK AISI also coordinates the International Network for Advanced AI Measurement, Evaluation and Science – a group of 10 AI security institutes and equivalents – which has already published its own and socialised others’ best practices.
- A track record of shaping industry practice: AISI has already helped establish voluntary practices such as pre-release testing, and built Inspect, now the standard framework for leading third-party evaluators.
We're not seeking to mandate requirements. We want to contribute our expertise to an industry-wide effort to develop technical best practice that could later inform formal standards.
What we're working on:
Examples of our first priority areas include:
- Overseeing AI systems: what monitoring and controls developers need to make sure AI systems behave as intended, and how to preserve that oversight as systems become more capable.
- Sharing information on the speed of AI development: which metrics best track progress, including AI's use in its own development, and when they should be shared with governments and the public.
- Assessing and documenting risk: what risk assessments and safety cases should cover, and what standard of evidence they should meet.
About the role
Primary objective: turn AISI's technical expertise into authoritative best-practice documents that frontier AI developers find valuable and use, and into clear explanations of why those practices matter.
You'll work closely with AISI researchers and the standards team on two kinds of writing.
Example responsibilities:
-
Best-practice documents (about 50%)
- Work with researchers to decide what form each piece of best practice should take, and how it should be structured.
- Own delivery of best-practice documents, co-drafting by managing researchers’ technical input and editing to ensure each practice is coherent, specific, testable and technically accurate.
- Set out the technical rationale for each practice, drawing on research findings, threat models and evaluation results, so the case for it is evidence-based and credible to a diverse set of expert readers.
- Develop a consistent style, templates and terminology for AISI best practice documents, and run review rounds with internal and external experts.
-
Explainers (about 50%)
- Write public explainers and technical blog posts setting out the reasoning behind AISI's best practice: why it matters, and what it means for developers, policymakers and the public. For example, the series that follow our agenda, Towards technical best practice for frontier AI development.
- Manage multi-stakeholder drafting processes, engaging with feedback from industry, wider government and expert third parties.
- Adapt material for different audiences, from technical researchers to non-technical policy readers, working with AISI's communications team.
Reporting and growth:
You'll report to the Head of Technical Standards and Best Practice. This role by default has no line management responsibilities thought responsibility will scale as the team grows. You'll learn from AISI's researchers across a wide range of frontier AI safety topics, and help shape a new team as it grows.
What we are looking for
We're flexible on the exact profile and expect successful candidates will meet many, but not necessarily all, of the criteria below. This role is most likely to fall at Level 4, but we are open to exceptional candidates at other levels.
Essential:
We're looking for someone who can:
- Understand nuanced technical AI safety work well enough to explain its claims and limitations accurately,
- Write precise, structured documents that set out what organisations should do and why,
- Explain the same technical topics clearly and engagingly to non-technical readers
For example, you might have:
- Written or co-written AI research papers, such as preprints on arXiv.
- Written in-depth technical communication on AI working directly with researchers, such as AI company blog posts or technical reports.
- Written technical guidance, standards or documentation in a complex field.
- Written for public or policy audiences on technical topics.
You don't need all of these. For a sense of the level and style we're looking for, see the work our research teams publish on the AISI blog by our research teams.
Desirable:
- Familiarity with one or more of our priority areas: monitorability, safety cases and risk reports, or AI research automation.
- Extensive experience communicating AI security concepts for policy audiences.
- Experience running the writing of a multi-author document: gathering input from several experts, resolving conflicting feedback and getting it to publication.
- Familiarity with how frontier AI developers, evaluators or standards bodies work, for example from working at or alongside them.
Example backgrounds:
- An AI safety researcher who has published several papers and especially enjoys the writing and framing side of research.
- A technical writer or science communicator with a machine learning degree or AI background, who has co-written papers or reports on AI research.
- A research engineer or analyst at an AI safety organisation who has led writing on published frameworks or reports.
Core requirements
- You should be able to spend at least 4 days per week working with us.
- No security clearance is needed to apply. Eligibility for Security Check (SC) clearance is preferred, but not essential. More detail on clearance eligibility can be found on the UK Government website: National security vetting: clearance levels - GOV.UK.
Interview process
Candidates should expect to go through some or all of the following stages once an application has been submitted:
- Initial interview
- Technical take home test
- Second interview and review of take home test
- Third interview
- Final interview with members of the senior team
What We Offer
Impact you couldn't have anywhere else
- Incredibly talented, mission-driven and supportive colleagues.
- Direct influence on how frontier AI is governed and deployed globally.
- Work with the Prime Minister’s AI Advisor and leading AI companies.
- Opportunity to shape the first & best-resourced public-interest research team focused on AI security.
Resources & access
- Pre-release access to multiple frontier models and ample compute.
- Extensive operational support so you can focus on research and ship quickly.
- Work with experts across national security, policy, AI research and adjacent sciences.
Growth & autonomy
- If you’re talented and driven, you’ll own important problems early.
- 5 days off and annual stipends for learning and development, and funding for conferences and external collaborations.
- Freedom to pursue research bets without product pressure.
- Opportunities to publish and collaborate externally.
Life & family*
- Modern central London office, or where applicable, option to work in similar government offices in Birmingham, Cardiff, Darlington, Edinburgh, Salford or Bristol.
- Hybrid working, flexibility for occasional remote work abroad and stipends for work-from-home equipment.
- At least 25 days’ annual leave, 8 public holidays, extra team-wide breaks and 3 days off for volunteering.
- Generous paid parental leave (36 weeks of UK statutory leave shared between parents + 3 extra paid weeks + option for additional unpaid time).
- On top of your salary, we contribute 28.97% of your base salary to your pension.
- Discounts and benefits for cycling to work, donations and retail/gyms.
*These benefits apply to direct employees. Benefits may differ for individuals joining through other employment arrangements such as secondments.
Salary
Annual salary is benchmarked to role scope and relevant experience. Most offers land between £65,000 and £145,000 made up of a base salary plus a technical allowance (take-home salary = base + technical allowance). An additional 28.97% employer pension contribution is paid on the base salary.
This role sits outside of the DDaT pay framework given the scope of this role requires in depth technical expertise in frontier AI safety, robustness and advanced AI architectures.
The full range of salaries are available below:
- Level 3: £65,000–£75,000 (Base £40,850 + Technical Allowance £24,150–£34,150)
- Level 4: £85,000–£95,000 (Base £48,540 + Technical Allowance £36,460–£46,460)
- Level 5: £105,000–£115,000 (Base £63,165 + Technical Allowance £41,835–£51,835)
- Level 6: £125,000–£135,000 (Base £76,475 + Technical Allowance £48,525–£58,525)
- Level 7: £145,000 (Base £76,475 + Technical Allowance £68,525)
Additional Information
Use of AI in Applications
Artificial Intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.
Use of AI tools in recruitment
We may use AI tools to help our hiring team review applications, for example by summarising application materials and helping us prioritise them against the published criteria. We do not use AI tools to find information about you from other sources, including online. People make every decision. We do not make solely automated decisions about candidates. Find out more, including your rights, in our recruitment privacy notice: https://www.aisi.gov.uk/careers/privacy-policy.
Internal Fraud Database
The Internal Fraud function of the Fraud, Error, Debt and Grants Function at the Cabinet Office processes details of civil servants who have been dismissed for committing internal fraud, or who would have been dismissed had they not resigned. The Cabinet Office receives the details from participating government organisations of civil servants who have been dismissed, or who would have been dismissed had they not resigned, for internal fraud. In instances such as this, civil servants are then banned for 5 years from further employment in the civil service. The Cabinet Office then processes this data and discloses a limited dataset back to DLUHC as a participating government organisations. DLUHC then carry out the pre employment checks so as to detect instances where known fraudsters are attempting to reapply for roles in the civil service. In this way, the policy is ensured and the repetition of internal fraud is prevented. For more information please see - Internal Fraud Register.
Security
Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check and get baseline personnel security standard (BPSS) clearance before they can be appointed. Additionally, there is a strong preference for eligibility for counter-terrorist check (CTC) clearance. Some roles may require higher levels of clearance, and we will state this by exception in the job advertisement. See our vetting charter here.Nationality requirements
We may be able to offer roles to applicant from any nationality or background. As such we encourage you to apply even if you do not meet the standard nationality requirements (opens in a new window).
