The EFF Benefit Poker Tournament is back for DEF CON 34! Your buy-in is paired with a donation to support EFF’s mission to protect online privacy and free expression for all. Play for glory. Play for money. Play for the future of the web. Seating is limited, so reserve your spot today.
When: Friday, August 7, 2026 - 12:00-15:00
Where: Horseshoe Poker Room, 3645 S Las Vegas Blvd, Las Vegas, NV 89109
Tournament Specs: $100 Horseshoe tournament buy-in, with a donation of $250 or more to EFF to sign up. (AND all players will receive a complimentary EFF Gold Level Membership for the year.) Re-buys are unlimited to level 6, with each having a suggested donation of $100 on site. Levels will be fifteen minutes, and the blinds go up at each level. Attendees must be 21+.
Pre-Tournament Clinic: Have a friend that might be interested but not sure how to play? Have you played some poker before but could use a refresher? Join poker pro Mike Wheeler (Tarah’s dad) and celebrities for a free poker clinic from 11:00 am-11:45 am just before the tournament. Mike will show you the rules, strategy, table behavior, and general Vegas slang at the poker table. Even if you know poker pretty well, come a bit early and help out.
Emcee & Celebrity Guests: We’ll have Celebrity Bounties again! Knock out a celebrity and get neat EFF swag and the respect of your peers! Plus, as always, knock out Tarah's dad Mike, and she donates $250 to the EFF in your name!
The Celebrities: This year's event will feature many of our legal celebrities in our Lawyers vs Hackers edition.
Cindy Cohn
Former Executive Director, EFF
Cindy Cohn is the former Executive Director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and author of Privacy’s Defender: My Thirty-Year Fight Against Digital Surveillance. From 2000-2015 she served as EFF’s Legal Director as well as its General Counsel. Ms. Cohn first became involved with EFF in 1993, when EFF asked her to serve as the outside lead attorney in Bernstein v. Dept. of Justice, the successful First Amendment challenge to the U.S. export restrictions on cryptography.
Jennifer Granick
Hacker lawyer 1.0
Throughout her career, Jennifer Granick has fought for civil liberties in an age of massive surveillance and powerful digital technology. As the former surveillance and cybersecurity counsel with the ACLU Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, she litigated, spoke, and wrote about privacy, security, technology, and constitutional rights. Granick is the author of the book American Spies: Modern Surveillance, Why You Should Care, and What To Do About It, published by Cambridge Press and winner of the 2016 Palmer Civil Liberties Prize.
Marcia Hofmann
Founder and principal of Zeitgeist Law
Founder and principal of Zeitgeist Law, a boutique law firm focused on information security, computer crime, electronic privacy, free expression, and intellectual property issues. In the past, she has worked at Twitter, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and the Electronic Privacy Information Center. She was a US-UK Fulbright Cyber Security Scholar based at the University of Oxford, where she studied educational and restorative justice programs for young computer crime offenders. She has taught courses in computer crime at Colorado Law and Internet law at UC Law San Francisco (then known as UC Hastings).
Kurt Opsahl
Associate General Counsel for Cybersecurity and Civil Liberties Policy, Filecoin Foundation
Kurt Opsahl is the Associate General Counsel for Cybersecurity and Civil Liberties Policy for the Filecoin Foundation. Formerly, Opsahl was the Deputy Executive Director and General Counsel of EFF. Opsahl was also the lead attorney on the Coders' Rights Project, and continues to assist EFF with that work.
Liz Wharton
Founder, Silver Key Strategies
Elizabeth (Liz) Wharton leverages two decades of legal, public policy, and business experience to build and scale cybersecurity and threat intelligence focused companies. Prior experience includes leading a third-party risk threat intelligence platform startup and serving as Atlanta's Senior Attorney overseeing technology policy and projects for the Airport and on it's ransomware incident immediate IR team. Awarded the 2022 “Cybersecurity or Privacy Woman Law Professional of the Year” by the United Cybersecurity Alliance, Liz volunteers as a mentor and for the Rural Technology Fund (Board member), ICS Village's Hack the Capitol (Planning Committee), and DEFCON (CFP Review Board). She received her JD from Georgia State University and her BA from Virginia Tech.
The Glory: The tournament winner will receive the traditional Jelly Bean Trophy and we hope you’ll like this year’s newest add: We will have bug bounty pins this year! When you take someone out of the tournament, they will give you a pin. Prizes—and major bragging rights—go to the player with the most bounty pins.
