Senior Research Scientist at Thorn

Thorn is a non-profit focused on building technology to defend children from sexual abuse. Working at Thorn allows you to apply your skills, expertise, and passions to directly impact the lives of vulnerable and abused children. Our staff solves dynamic, quickly evolving problems with our network of partners from tech companies, NGOs, and law enforcement agencies. If you can bring clarity to complexity and lightness to heavy issues, you could be an excellent fit for our team. 
In 2019, we took the stage at TED and shared our audacious goal of eliminating child sexual abuse material from the internet. 
About the Role:
As a Senior Research Scientist, you will independently, and in partnership with the Research & Insights team, advance Thorn’s organizational knowledge of online child sexual exploitation and emerging trends. The work you do will be a combination of finding quick wins and developing longer-term research. You will be responsible for acquiring data, crafting and performing analytical experiments in a disciplined manner, evaluating and iterating on results, and discussing results with both technical and non-technical audiences. You’ll work closely with the Head of Research & Insights to grow the Research team’s impact, both internally and externally, by delivering nimble, innovative, and rigorous research. 
What You’ll Do:

Serve as a source of issue expertise in online child sexual exploitation and emerging trends. Mastering a variety of concepts and related data points to help Thorn make strategic decisions off the best information available.

Lead a diverse portfolio of research projects leveraging a variety of large, unstructured data sources to drive understanding of trends in online child sexual exploitation 

Implement new statistical or machine learning methodologies as needed for specific models or analyses
Draft briefs and reports that clearly and accurately distill nuanced subjects to a range of technical and non-technical audiences
Create visualizations to facilitate strategic decision making
Keep up to date with the newest developments in statistical analysis and related data science technologies
Mentor teammates fostering critical thinking and excellence in our research
Actively pursue diversity and inclusion in Thorn research to ensure all kids are represented in our understanding of this issue
Intentionally and proactively practice, defend and improve data ethics and statistical integrity, both in own work and cross-functionally across teams

Skills We’re Seeking

At least five years experience in statistical analysis and/or data science using either Python or R with at least moderate knowledge of Python. 
At least two years mentoring and coaching colleagues via pairing, research design, and code review
Strong written, verbal, and visual communication skills, and the ability to tailor messaging to a range of audiences 
Some travel will be required in the future
Prior knowledge of child exploitation/abuse issues is a plus
Desire to serve Thorn’s mission

Technologies We Use

Python, Jupyter notebooks
Python packages for statistical analysis and ML, like scikit-learn, statsmodels, etc.
NLP tools like NLP tools like Spacy, Gensim, or Hugging Face transformers.
ElasticSearch, SQL
Network analysis tools like NetworkX, neo4j graph algorithms
Github for code version control
DVC for version control of non-code data analysis artifacts

You should have at least four years of professional experience with these:

Python or R for data analysis
Statistical inference, hypothesis testing, regression analysis
Time series analysis
Data quality analysis
Unsupervised learning / clustering techniques

In addition, you should have non-trivial experience with:

Network analysis / social networks analysis

Expertise in any of the following is a major plus:

NLP
Raw data collection and processing, like web scraping, working with APIs to collect data, working with open source data, and querying databases
Bias assessment
In-depth knowledge of digital photo image metadata, photo editing techniques, webcams
Linguistics, especially computational linguistics
Experience in Anthropology, Psychology/Sociology, Epidemiology, Criminology, Forensic Science, Fraud detection
Emerging trends detection
Data visualization

At Thorn, we understand the value of developing a team with different perspectives, educational backgrounds, and life experiences. We prioritize diversity within our team and encourage people from underrepresented backgrounds to apply. Your skills are needed here.