Investigative Data Developer

Location: Preferably based in Amsterdam, but open to remote opportunities for the right candidate. 

Application Deadline: Midnight, Sunday, Aug 17th 2025

About OCCRP

OCCRP (Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project) is one of the largest investigative journalism organizations in the world, headquartered in Amsterdam and with staff across six continents. We are a mission-driven nonprofit newsroom that partners with other media outlets to publish stories that lead to real-world action. At the same time, our media development arm helps investigative outlets around the world succeed and serve the public.

Our mission is to spread and strengthen investigative journalism around the world and expose crime and corruption so the public can hold power to account. Our work has four main pillars: Investigations - we lead collaborative cross-border projects and publish hard-hitting stories; Infrastructure - we provide training, tools, and resources so investigative outlets can thrive; Innovation - we develop new technology and solutions that serve the field of journalism; and Impact - we accelerate the fight against global crime and corruption with groundbreaking partnerships.

Position overview

We are looking for an experienced python developer to join OCCRP’s data team. Our projects help investigative journalists to access vast amounts of data and to unravel complex stories about corruption and fraud. You will join a team of data specialists who use a variety of techniques to acquire, organize and analyse data needed for follow-the-money investigations.

Expect to spend your time scraping company registries, accessing APIs, ingesting leaks and manipulating SQL databases. A large part of the role involves working with Aleph - OCCRP’s investigative data platform with over two billion entities from leaks, company and property registries and public records. You will clean and process the data, making it available and searchable on Aleph. You will help journalists to use Aleph and make sense of data. This could be running cross references to find the overlap with other data, or doing statistical analysis and calculations to provide the reporters with the information they need. This work is invaluable to our reporting - you will be an essential player in finding leads and supporting stories that hold those in power to account.

You will be trained to work in-depth with Aleph and the data team’s ecosystem of tooling and scraping workflows. Security is of the utmost importance considering the sensitivity of some of the data we work with and you will be required to adhere to our strict security standards.

Job description  

You must be able to work from 8-hour workdays, but relative to your location of work. The kinds of work you will be expected to perform include:

• Supporting journalists to work with data in their investigations by understanding what they are trying to do, scoping the project, and working with other technical colleagues to deliver it.
• Handling communications back and forth in easy-to-understand language, tracking queries and documenting your work.
• Building data extraction and cleaning solutions for specific datasets using web crawlers and cleaning and importing leaked datasets. 
• Assisting in maintaining and improving existing crawlers and datasets as needed.
• Analysing and summarising new leaks, finding angles for stories, exploring and communicating key connections and leads, suggesting other relevant resources.
• Liaising with the Aleph product team to coordinate on investigative needs and with the Research Team on overlapping research and stories.
• Exploring improved ways for journalists to understand and interface with OCCRP’s diverse data sources.

Person Description

Essential Skills:

• Adept at basic statistical methods
• Good knowledge of Python
• Comfortable working with SQL databases (we use PostgreSQL)
• Knowledge of Linux: bash, basic networking
• Excellent knowledge and experience of web scraping and relevant technologies
• Ability to communicate effectively and express ideas in a clear and concise manner; Proficiency in English as well as other languages a plus. 
• Ability to manage expectations in a fluid, diverse, and fast-paced environment
  

Skills Desirable

• Familiar with Docker and Kubernetes
• Competent with Google Cloud
• Familiar with concepts of operational security

Experience Essential

• At least 5 years working on data-centric projects
• At least 3 years of web scraping experience
• Experience working on civic technology or data journalism projects with journalists and activists

Experience Desirable

• Experience managing data projects with a diverse team
• Experience teaching data skills to non-technical people
• Managed data projects using GKE and Google Cloud
• Familiarity with finding and working with public records and registers

To Apply: 

To apply, please upload a cover letter, resume, a list of projects you have worked on that reflect the skills and experience we are looking for with a brief description of your role in them (see above), and a list of references that respond to further inquiry about your work and performance.

All applications must be submitted in English. Incomplete applications will not be considered. Whilst we have internal goals to reply to unsuccessful candidates, we regret that the high number of applicants greatly exceeds our capacity to respond to each person. We apologise that we will not be able to reply to any unsuccessful applicants.

As an equal opportunity employer, OCCRP values having a diverse workforce and continuously strives to maintain an inclusive and equitable workplace. We offer competitive compensation and benefits and encourage people with a diverse range of backgrounds to apply. We do not discriminate against any person based upon race, religion, color, national origin, sex, medical conditions, family status, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, disability, genetic information, or any other legally protected characteristics. If you are a qualified applicant requiring assistance or an accommodation to complete any step of the application process, please contact hr@occrp.org.