Lead Graph Data Scientist – Identity Analytics

USAA

Lead Graph Data Scientist at USAA focusing on identity analytics and fraud detection models. Collaborate across teams to enhance and deploy modeling techniques for fraud prevention.

Posted 7/7/2026full-timeSan Antonio • Arizona, Colorado, Florida, North Carolina, Texas, Virginia • 🇺🇸 United StatesSenior💰 $164,780 - $314,960 per yearWebsite

Tech Stack

Tools & technologies

NoSQLPythonSQL

About the role

Key responsibilities & impact

Develop and continuously update internal identity theft and authentication models to mitigate fraud losses and reduce negative member experience from fraud applications, synthetic fraud, and account takeover attempts.
Closely partner with the Strategy team, Director of Fraud Identity Analytics, Director of Fraud Model Management, and model users on model builds and priorities.
Partner with Technology and other key collaborators to deploy a Member Protection graph technology strategy, including vendor selection, business requirements, data needs, and clear use cases spanning financial crimes.
Deploy graph databases and graph techniques to identify criminal networks engaging in fraud, scams, disputes/claims, and AML, improving fraud detection and loss mitigation.
Generate and prioritize fraud-dense rings to mitigate losses and improve Member experience.
Identify and work with technology to integrate new data sources for models and graphs to augment predictive power and improve business performance.
Exports insights to decision systems to enable better fraud targeting and model development efforts.
Drives continuous innovation in modeling efforts including advanced techniques like graph neural networks.
Develops and mentors junior staff, establishing a culture of R&D to augment the day-to-day aspects of the job.
Gathers, interprets, and manipulates sophisticated structured and unstructured data to enable sophisticated analytical solutions for the business.
Leads and conducts sophisticated analytics demonstrating machine learning, simulation, and optimization to deliver business insights and achieve business objectives.
Guides the team selecting the appropriate modeling technique and/or technology with consideration for data limitations, application, and business needs.
Develops and deploys models within the Model Development Control (MDC) and Model Risk Management (MRM) framework.
Composes and peer reviews technical documents for knowledge persistence, risk management, and technical review audiences.
Partners with business leaders from across the organization to proactively identify business needs and propose/recommend analytical and modeling projects to generate business value.
Works with business and analytics leaders to prioritize analytics and highly sophisticated modeling problems/research initiatives.
Leads efforts to build and maintain a robust library of reusable, production-quality algorithms and supporting code to ensure model development and research efforts are transparent and based on highest-quality data.
Assists the team with translating business request(s) into specific analytical questions, implementing analysis and/or modeling, and communicating outcomes to non-technical business colleagues with a focus on business action and recommendations.
Manages project portfolio milestones, risks, and impediments. Anticipates potential issues that could limit project success or implementation and escalates as needed.
Establishes and maintains standard methodologies for engaging with Data Engineering and IT to deploy production-ready analytical assets consistent with modeling best practices and model risk management standards.
Interacts with internal and external peers and management to maintain expertise and awareness of leading techniques.
Actively seeks opportunities and materials to learn new techniques, technologies, and methodologies.
Serves as a mentor to data scientists in modeling, analytics, computer science, business acumen, and other interpersonal skills.
Participates in enterprise-level efforts to drive the maintenance and transformation of data science technologies and culture.
Ensures risks associated with business activities are effectively identified, measured, monitored, and controlled in accordance with risk and compliance policies and procedures.

Requirements

What you’ll need

Bachelor's degree in mathematics, computer science, statistics, economics, finance, actuarial sciences, science and engineering, or other similar quantitative field; OR 4 years of experience in statistics, mathematics, quantitative analytics, or related experience (in addition to the minimum years of experience required) may be substituted in lieu of degree.
8 years of experience in predictive analytics or data analysis
6 years of experience in training and validating statistical, physical, machine learning, and other advanced analytics models.
4 years of experience in one or more dynamic scripted languages (such as Python, R, etc.) for performing statistical analyses and/or building and scoring AI/ML models.
Expert ability to write code that is easy to follow, well documented, and commented where necessary to explain logic (high code transparency).
Strong experience in querying and preprocessing data from structured and/or unstructured databases using query languages such as SQL, NoSQL, etc.
Strong experience in working with structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data files such as delimited numeric data files, JSON/XML files, and/or text documents, images, etc.
Excellent demonstrated skill in performing ad-hoc analytics using descriptive, diagnostic, and inferential statistics.
Proven ability to assess and articulate regulatory implications and expectations of distinct modeling efforts.
Project management experience that demonstrates the ability to anticipate and appropriately manage project milestones, risks, and impediments.
Demonstrated history of appropriately communicating potential issues that could limit project success or implementation.
Expert level experience with the concepts and technologies associated with classical supervised modeling for prediction such as linear/logistic models, discriminant analysis, support vector machines, decision trees, and ensemble methods such as Random Forests, XGBoost, LightGBM, and CatBoost.
Expert level experience with the concepts and technologies associated with unsupervised modeling such as k-means clustering, hierarchical/agglomerative clustering, nearest-neighbors algorithms, DBSCAN, etc.
Demonstrated experience in guiding and mentoring junior technical staff in business interactions and model building.
Demonstrated ability to communicate ideas with team members and/or business leaders to convey and present very technical information to an audience that may have little or no understanding of technical concepts in data science.
A strong track record of communicating results, insights, and technical solutions to senior executive management (or equivalent).
Extensive technical skills, consulting experience, and business savvy to collaborate with all levels and subject areas within the organization.

Benefits

Comp & perks

comprehensive medical, dental and vision plans
401(k)
pension
life insurance
parental benefits
adoption assistance
paid time off program with paid holidays plus 16 paid volunteer hours
various wellness programs
career path planning and continuing education

ATS Keywords

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Applicant Tracking System Keywords

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Hard Skills & Tools

PythonRSQLNoSQLStatistical AnalysisMachine LearningGraph Neural NetworksData ManipulationModel Risk ManagementAdvanced Analytics

Soft Skills

MentoringCommunicationCollaborationProblem SolvingLeadership