Senior Data Scientist, Fraud Operations

Navan
Bengaluru, India
On-site

Who this role is best for

Aimed at mid-to-senior level data scientists with fraud detection expertise who can work collaboratively in a fast-paced, technical environment.

Best fit for

  • Candidates with 5+ years of fraud analytics experience in financial or payment domains
    — “5+ years of experience in data science strategy, with a strong focus on fraud detection, risk modeling, or financial crime analytics.”
  • Individuals with advanced degrees in quantitative fields and production ML deployment experience
    — “Master’s (must-have) or PhD (preferred) in Computer Science, Statistics, Applied Mathematics, or related quantitative field.”
  • Professionals adept at translating data science insights into scalable fraud prevention systems
    — “Partner cross-functionally with other Risk Strategy team members, Fraud operations, Engineering, and Product teams to translate insights into scalable prevention rules, thresholds, and model-driven interventions.”

Things to consider

  • The role demands ownership of the full ML model lifecycle, including retraining and post-deployment optimization
    — “Own model lifecycle management from feature engineering and experimentation to monitoring, model retraining, and post-deployment optimisation.”
  • Candidates must be prepared to work with external vendors and third-party data sources
    — “Partner with external vendors and third-party data sources to enrich detection signals and improve model precision and recall.”

How to stand out

  • Highlight experience in anomaly detection and network/graph modeling with fraud-specific use cases
    — “Drive applied research in anomaly detection, network/graph modelling, real-time clustering, and link analysis to identify emerging fraud patterns and organized fraud rings.”
  • Emphasize measurable impact in fraud loss reduction and model performance improvements
    — “Sign up for the stretch fraud loss goals and the ability to drive the roadmap to meet the goal.”
  • Demonstrate hands-on experience with large-scale data platforms like Snowflake or Databricks
    — “Experience with large-scale data environments such as Snowflake, Databricks, Spark, or equivalent big data platforms.”
  • Showcase communication of complex findings to non-technical executives
    — “Proven ability to communicate complex data science findings to technical and non-technical audiences, including executives.”
  • Demonstrate leadership in mentoring junior data scientists and fraud analysts
    — “Mentor junior data scientists and fraud analysts, providing technical guidance and driving excellence in experimentation, model governance, and reproducibility.”
Pace · Fast PacedCollaboration · HighAutonomy · HighDecision Impact · Company

Derived from job-description analysis by Serendipath's career intelligence engine.

What success looks like

  • advanced fraud models
  • real-time fraud monitoring
  • scalable prevention rules
Typical background
Master’s in Computer Science, Statistics, Applied Mathematics

Skills & requirements

Required

Machine LearningFraud DetectionData ModelingAnomaly DetectionNetwork Analysis

Preferred

Real-time ClusteringLink Analysis

Stack & domain

PythonSQLMachine LearningPredictive ModellingAnomaly DetectionNetwork AnalysisFraud DetectionRisk ModelingFinancial Crime Analytics

About the role

Original posting from Navan

Navan is expanding its Fraud Risk Management team to build world-class fraud detection, prevention, and analytics capabilities supporting our rapidly growing travel and expense businesses. We are seeking a highly skilled and visionary Data Scientist, Fraud, to design and scale advanced data science solutions that protect Navan’s customers, platform, and financial ecosystem.

This is a strategic and hands-on role, where you’ll partner with other fraud strategy members, product, engineering, and data teams to design the ML features, build the rule workflow, build next-generation fraud models, develop actionable insights, and lead the application of AI/ML to mitigate emerging fraud threats both in expense card issuing and travel fraud. The ideal candidate combines deep technical expertise in machine learning and data systems with a strong understanding of payment, identity, and transactional fraud patterns.

Location: Bangalore, India

What You’ll Do

Lead the design and deployment of advanced ML features, build rule workflows to detect and prevent fraud across travel and expense.

Lead the design and development of advanced ML and statistical models to detect, predict, and prevent fraudulent behavior across onboarding, payments, and expense workflows.

Drive applied research in anomaly detection, network/graph modelling, real-time clustering, and link analysis to identify emerging fraud patterns and organized fraud rings.

Partner cross-functionally with other Risk Strategy team members, Fraud operations, Engineering, and Product teams to translate insights into scalable prevention rules, thresholds, and model-driven interventions.

Own model lifecycle management from feature engineering and experimentation to monitoring, model retraining, and post-deployment optimisation.

Perform root-cause and loss attribution analyses, identifying vulnerabilities and quantifying financial impact to inform control effectiveness and business risk appetite.

Sign up for the stretch fraud loss goals and the ability to drive the roadmap to meet the goal.

Collaborate with Data Engineering and Platform teams to define data schemas, pipelines, and infrastructure that enable real-time fraud monitoring and analytics.

Mentor junior data scientists and fraud analysts, providing technical guidance and driving excellence in experimentation, model governance, and reproducibility.

Contribute to the overall fraud strategy roadmap, helping evolve Navan’s machine learning and analytics capabilities to stay ahead of emerging fraud trends.

Partner with external vendors and third-party data sources to enrich detection signals and improve model precision and recall.

What We’re Looking For

5+ years of experience in data science strategy, with a strong focus on fraud detection, risk modeling, or financial crime analytics.

Master’s (must-have) or PhD (preferred) in Computer Science, Statistics, Applied Mathematics, or related quantitative field.

Deep technical expertise in machine learning, predictive modelling, anomaly detection, and network analysis applied to fraud problems.

Proficiency in Python, SQL, and modern ML libraries.

Experience with large-scale data environments such as Snowflake, Databricks, Spark, or equivalent big data platforms.

Strong understanding of payment processing, card networks, identity verification, and behavioural fraud typologies (e.g., synthetic identities, ATO, friendly fraud, first-party fraud, third-party fraud, scams).

Demonstrated success in developing and deploying ML models in production, including monitoring and score drift management.

Familiarity with fraud detection tools, rule engines, and streaming data systems is a plus.

Proven ability to communicate complex data science findings to technical and non-technical audiences, including executives.

Experience collaborating in cross-functional teams that include Product, Engineering, and Fraud Operations.

Navan uses AI-assisted Automated Employment Decision Tool (Metaview) to assist with evaluating resumes against job qualifications for this role. All final decisions are made by human recruiters and hiring managers. 

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Source: Navan careers

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