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Shari Steele

b. 2000

American activist

Activist Lawyer Executive director
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About Shari Steele

Born 2000. Shari Steele is an American activist, lawyer and executive director.

Shari Steele is a technologist, lawyer, and activist for digital freedom. She worked for the Electronic Frontier Foundation as the legal director and then executive director, as well as at The Tor Project as the executive director.

Career Steele joined the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) as a staff attorney in 1992. She later became the legal director, a position she held for eight years before she became the EFF's executive director in 2000. Steele helped to grow the EFF from a small team of lawyers to a much larger organization known for its involvement in legal disputes involving digital rights, including challenges to broad digital surveillance practices by the National Security Agency (NSA) and to the United States government's use of National Security Letters.

Although she had intended to retire when she left the EFF, she instead decided to take a position as the executive director of the Tor Project in 2015, which she held until the end of 2019. She is known for her work at The Tor Project to make the organization more inclusive, as well as for guiding the organization through a major scandal involving accusations of sexual assault against Jacob Appelbaum, a Tor employee and activist.

Life and education Steele earned her law degree from Widener University School of Law. She later earned an LL.M. degree from Georgetown University Law Center, where she also worked as a teaching fellow. Steele also has a master's degree in Instructional Media, which she earned from West Chester University.

Steele is married to Bill Vass, the vice president of engineering at Amazon Web Services.

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Important facts

Born
2000
Birth century
Nationality
Education
Georgetown University Law Center, West Chester University, Widener University School of Law
Employers
Electronic Frontier Foundation, The Tor Project, Inc, The Tor Project

People in Shari Steele's life

Named in this biography and alive at the same time

Contemporaries

People whose lives overlapped Shari Steele's

Frequently asked questions

Who is Shari Steele?

American activist

When was Shari Steele born?

Shari Steele was born in 2000.

What is Shari Steele's occupation?

Shari Steele is an activist, lawyer and executive director.

What nationality is Shari Steele?

Shari Steele is American.

Sources & further reading

· Wikipedia: Shari Steele

· Wikidata: Q30748335

· DBpedia: Shari Steele

Cite this page

APA: Biography.guide. (2026). Shari Steele. https://biography.guide/shari-steele/

MLA: "Shari Steele." Biography.guide, https://biography.guide/shari-steele/.

Chicago: "Shari Steele." Biography.guide. https://biography.guide/shari-steele/.

Data last updated: 2026-09-22 · Spot an error? Report a correction.

Portrait: Wikimedia Commons · author & licence

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