Official Bio

Violet Blue is a six-time Independent Publisher Book Award (“IPPY”) winning investigative journalist on cybersecurity, privacy, digital rights, and Covid-19, having bylined for outlets including O The Oprah Magazine, Engadget, Financial Times, CNET, CNN, CBS News, San Francisco Chronicle, PC World, Popular Science, Read Write Web, Yahoo News, ZDNet, and many others.

Guardian UK called Ms. Blue, “One of the leading figures in tech writing in the world.” She is a member of the Internet Press Guild, the Authors Guild, The New Zealand Society of Authors (PEN NZ), and Advisor to online legal privacy resource Without My Consent. Her conference appearances include ETech, LeWeb, CCC, the Forbes Brand Leadership Conference, two Google Tech Talks, and several talks over many years at SXSW Interactive.

Her new book A Fish Has No Word For Water won 2023 Independent Publisher Book Awards GOLD and has been selected as National Indie Book Awards 2023 Finalist. KIRKUS calls it “Gripping.” BookLife (Publisher’s Weekly) describes it as a “Superb memoir” with “Sharp dialogue, incisive observations, and polished prose.”

Blue’s 2017 guidebook on personal digital privacy and security, The Smart Girl’s Guide to Privacy, was praised by ELLE Magazine as, “An illuminating handbook for women.” Ingram Collection Development Librarian Becky Walton wrote, “Violet Blue is not just a writer and journalist; she’s also a friend and advocate to every female* who has a computer or smartphone…This book is highly recommended for public and school libraries, as well as social science and technology classes.” Book Riot wrote, “It’s up to each one of us to protect our own privacy, and The Smart Girl’s Guide to Privacy is a crucial weapon in that fight.”

Ms. Blue’s most notable book appearance was on The Oprah Winfrey Show. Her books have been translated into French, German, Italian, Spanish, and Russian. She has also been a guest on The Tyra Banks Show, CNN, NPR, BBC, and HBO’s Thought Crimes.

Ms. Blue has 15 years of experience in leading healthcare crisis communications workshops and trainings. This includes her roles as Workshop leader: Media Training for UCSF Global Health Masters Program; Workshop leader: Yearly UCSF Health immersive NGO trainings: Complex Humanitarian Emergency Training (scenario: border crisis; teaching pre-acceptance Doctors Without Borders, American Red Cross, others, to spot, counter, and control media during crisis event.); and, Workshop leader: Human rights conventions, including Oslo Freedom Forum, teaching cybersecurity self-defense to high-risk human rights reporters. Ms. Blue led sexuality and gender crisis trainings for San Francisco Sex Information’s workshops for nurses, therapists, and sexuality and gender students, as well as trained new counselors to staff the organization’s emergency hotline.

Her other book titles have been featured in BBC, Blender, Bizarre Magazine, BookRiot, ChicagoNow, Cinematical, CNET, CNN, Columbia Journalism Review. Cosmopolitan, Cosmopolitan UK, Daily Dot, DAME Magazine, ELLE, Forbes, Foreword Reviews, Forum, Gizmodo, Glamour, Guardian UK, Harper’s, Jane, Marie Claire, Maxim, Men’s Fitness, Men’s Health. MSNBC, Newsweek, New York Times, NPR, O: The Oprah Magazine, PBS Mediashift, Playboy, Redbook, Salon, San Francisco Bay Guardian, San Francisco Examiner, San Jose Mercury News, Savage Love, Self Magazine, SFist, SF Weekly, Utne Reader, Vice (Motherboard), Village Voice, Wall Street Journal, WebMD, and Wired. Her work has been cited in numerous books including David Levy’s Love + Sex With Robots, The 4-Hour Body by Timothy Ferriss, and others.