Staff Data Scientist - Risk

About Shakepay

Since 2015, we’ve been building the Shakepay app to make buying and earning bitcoin fast, easy, and secure. In 2022, we launched the Shakepay Card, allowing shakers to earn bitcoin rewards when they shop. Today, more than one million Canadians use Shakepay to grow their bitcoin savings and take control of their financial future.

About the Risk Team

We’re reinstating a dedicated Risk team at Shakepay to build the next generation of our risk systems and decisioning capabilities. The team’s mission is to enable sustainable business growth by protecting customers, Shakepay, and the broader financial ecosystem from abuse, while balancing fraud prevention, regulatory compliance, customer experience, and operational efficiency.

Senior Data Scientist - Risk

We’re looking for a Staff Data Scientist to help define how Shakepay measures, understands, and manages risk. This role is analytics-first, with selective use of machine learning where it meaningfully improves understanding or decision quality. You’ll work closely with Risk Engineering and business partners to surface insights, guide prioritization, and evaluate the impact of risk controls.

What you’ll be doing

• Partner with engineering to define the architecture and technical strategy for internal risk systems and tooling.
• Partner with Risk, Engineering, Security, Compliance, Product, and Operations to define risk metrics, success criteria, and decision frameworks.
• Analyze fraud, scam, and abuse patterns across crypto and fiat products.
• Build and maintain reporting that tracks fraud loss, false positives, customer friction, operational efficiency, and control performance.
• Help design and architect the data, instrumentation, and decisioning systems that power risk operations and fraud prevention workflows.
• Evaluate and iterate on risk rules and controls using rigorous analysis.
• Apply statistical methods and selective ML techniques where they materially improve decision quality, operational efficiency, or signal detection.
• Conduct deep-dive investigations into incidents, trends, and emerging threats.
• Communicate insights clearly and persuasively to senior stakeholders.
• Help establish data standards, analytical methods, and decision-making practices within the Risk team.

What success looks like in the first 3-6 months

• Establish a clear understanding of current risk metrics, data sources, and decision processes.
• Identify and prioritize key areas for improvement in risk detection and operational workflows.
• Deliver actionable insights and recommendations that inform risk control changes or new initiatives.