eBay To Pay $3 Million Penalty For Employees Sending Live Cockroaches, Fetal Pig To Bloggers

E-commerce giant eBay agreed to pay a $3 million penalty for the harassment and stalking of a Massachusetts couple by several of its employees. "The couple, Ina and David Steiner, had been subjected to threats and bizarre deliveries, including live spiders, cockroaches, a funeral wreath and a bloody pig mask in August 2019," reports CBS News. From the report: Thursday's fine comes after several eBay employees ran a harassment and intimidation campaign against the Steiners, who publish a news website focusing on players in the e-commerce industry. "eBay engaged in absolutely horrific, criminal conduct. The company's employees and contractors involved in this campaign put the victims through pure hell, in a petrifying campaign aimed at silencing their reporting and protecting the eBay brand," Levy said. "We left no stone unturned in our mission to hold accountable every individual who turned the victims' world upside-down through a never-ending nightmare of menacing and criminal acts."

The Justice Department criminally charged eBay with two counts of stalking through interstate travel, two counts of stalking through electronic communications services, one count of witness tampering and one count of obstruction of justice. The company agreed to pay $3 million as part of a deferred prosecution agreement. Under the agreement, eBay will be required to retain an independent corporate compliance monitor for three years, officials said, to "ensure that eBay's senior leadership sets a tone that makes compliance with the law paramount, implements safeguards to prevent future criminal activity, and makes clear to every eBay employee that the idea of terrorizing innocent people and obstructing investigations will not be tolerated," Levy said.

Former U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling said the plan to target the Steiners, which he described as a "campaign of terror," was hatched in April 2019 at eBay. Devin Wenig, eBay's CEO at the time, shared a link to a post Ina Steiner had written about his annual pay. The company's chief communications officer, Steve Wymer, responded: "We are going to crush this lady." About a month later, Wenig texted: "Take her down." Prosecutors said Wymer later texted eBay security director Jim Baugh. "I want to see ashes. As long as it takes. Whatever it takes," Wymer wrote. Investigators said Baugh set up a meeting with security staff and dispatched a team to Boston, about 20 miles from where the Steiners live. "Senior executives at eBay were frustrated with the newsletter's tone and content, and with the comments posted beneath the newsletter's articles," the Department of Justice wrote in its Thursday announcement. Two former eBay security executives were sentenced to prison over the incident.

3 Million

[RegistrationIsDumb83]

So that's what, 15 minutes of revenue on eBay? These penalties need to be based on the size of the business so they're actually a deterrent. Especially given the original scheme was to silence criticism of eBay, it'd be easy for them to just look at it as a cost of doing business.

Re:

[TomR teh Pirate]

Agreed. This penalty doesn't even amount to a rounding error on a quarterly earnings statement

Re:

[mnemotronic]

I was thinking "they (Ebay) got off way too cheap. By a factor of 100". Govt should also prosecute the individuals who committed these acts.

Re:3 Million

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

Let's read tfa. Two guys are already sitting in jail over it. And a company is a lot more than a handful of asses.

Re:

[luis_a_espinal]

Let's read tfa.

But, if we do that, we lose the chance to launch dumb rants. It's slashdot, we live for the drama here, yo.

Re:3 Million

[arglebargle_xiv]

The EU has got it right in this regard, with penalties for big corporates in more recent legislation set as "x% of revenue" or "x% or earnings" for just this reason.

Re:

[christoban]

What if it was only those two "underlings" who were at all involved in it?

Should you literally go jail because some of your underlings did some really stupid stuff like that?

Why is it that some people are so damned quick to demand that people be "sent to jail!" for any and every little thing they find offensive? They send them a few slightly disturbing things in the mail, and the people involved are likely already in jail. How is that not enough?

Re:3 Million

[christoban]

Ok, now I've read the article fully YES WENIG SHOULD BE IN JAIL TOO.

Please don't hurt me...

Re:3 Million

[Vlad_the_Inhaler]

The company's chief communications officer, Steve Wymer, responded: "We are going to crush this lady." About a month later, Wenig texted: "Take her down." Prosecutors said Wymer later texted eBay security director Jim Baugh. "I want to see ashes. As long as it takes. Whatever it takes,"

Not just Wenig - Wymer also needs to go down. Jim Baugh was sentenced to 57 months over his part in this debacle, someone called David Harville got 24 months.

Re:

[christoban]

Man, I wish I knew what was in that letter that pissed him off so badly!

Re:3 Million

[Col. Klink (retired)]

"...makes clear to every eBay employee that the idea of terrorizing innocent people and obstructing investigations will not be tolerated."

I want the contract to build their corporate training module on "not terrorizing innocent people".

"The Daily Express" wrote an article criticizing your unethical business practices. Choose all of the appropriate responses:

___ Send them live spiders
___ Send them cockroaches
___ Send them a letter stating your point of view
___ Send them a funeral wreath stating your point of view
___ Investigate the claims and take internal action to address them
___ Send them a bloody pig mask

Re:3 Million

[Vlad_the_Inhaler]

Your list is incomplete, https://news.slashdot.org/story/20/06/15/1649202/six-former-ebay-employees-charged-in-federal-cyberstalking-case-targeting-natick-couple [slashdot.org].

Re:

[bookwormT3]

I want the contract to build their corporate training module on "not terrorizing innocent people".

"The Daily Express" wrote an article criticizing your unethical business practices. Choose all of the appropriate responses:

Passing score will be 80%, right?

Re:

[Vlad_the_Inhaler]

I'm pretty sure it was the Daly Mail which carried the headline "Enemies of the People" on their front page a couple of years back, along with photos of the three judges who had reached a verdict the Mail did not agree with. I don't think the Mail disagreed for legal reasons, but because it did not match their politics (one of Boris Johnson's Brexit measures broke the law).

Re:

[chas.williams]

___ Recite "Freedom of speech isn't freedom from consequences!" and do whatever you want.

Re:

[Hoi Polloi]

The real problem with ebay is that it is america's biggest stolen good fencing operation

Re:

[sabri]

Let's do the math. Their revenue over 2020 was 10.27 billion USD (their 2022 was actually lower). That's 28,136,986 per day, or $1,172,374 per hour, so $293,093 every 15 minutes. Also, that's $325 every second.

Now, given that eBay's "take rate", meaning the money they make on transactions, is roughly 11%, that means that they handle over $3,300 in transactions per second.

They can pay a small fine of $3M.

People need to go to jail for this.

[h0m3rs1mps0n]

Not just the underlings. This is a criminal conspiracy and it should reach the top of the company.

Re:

[ArchieBunker]

They kicked me out for selling ice cream.

Re:

[NomDeAlias]

I had the same thought and then read the last sentence in the snippet. You should read it too. You'll feel better.

Re:People need to go to jail for this.

[Firethorn]

Two former eBay security executives were sentenced to prison over the incident.

Short of the CEO, "executives" aren't "underlings".

I'm surprised anybody got prison time, so this is a positive.

Re:

[christoban]

Civil lawsuit scheduled for next year. After the admission of guilt, these guys are gonna make one fuck ton of money.

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[christoban]

Apparently they tried to put Wenig, the CEO, in jail, but he had isolated himself and they couldn't find evidence he knew exactly what his employees did (though he surely did).

I wish I knew what those guys wrote in that letter to set him off. Anyway, the civil trail starts next year and they're gonna be very wealthy.

Re:

[arglebargle_xiv]

Very different in the military: The doctrine of command responsibility means it goes, at least in theory, to the top.

In theory because in the US military specifically it tends to stop some of the way up, whereas in militaries the US has defeated it does go to the top.

Re:

[Vlad_the_Inhaler]

A quote (Wikipedia) and a link,

He is a director of General Motors and its subsidiary Cruise Automation, an autonomous vehicle company.

https://www.ecommercebytes.com/2021/06/24/former-ebay-ceo-devin-wenig-named-to-salesforce-advisory-board/ [ecommercebytes.com] (Wikipedia seems to think he's still there).
He fell on his feet.

Re:

[Mr. Dollar Ton]

Indeed. What the fuck?

More victims?

[ericspinder]

Who'd a thunk that e-Bay was a rotting cesspool of gangland activity and pressure campaigns. They had a team, this couldn't have been a 'one-off' thing, clearly there were other victims; I doubt if they killed anyone (directly), but I'm sure they ruined a few people along the way.

Re: More victims?

[firewrought]

If we're going to troll, let's mention that Trump also made donations to Hilary's campaign (for Senate). Which makes a lot of sense since he's not really a good Republican. But at that level, donations aren't about ideals, they're about cultivating influence.

Ebay are evil terrorists. They won't change.

[m00sh]

ensure that eBay's senior leadership sets a tone that makes compliance with the law paramount, implements safeguards to prevent future criminal activity, and makes clear to every eBay employee that the idea of terrorizing innocent people and obstructing investigations will not be tolerated,

More like senior leadership sets a deaf air to criminal behavior, implements no safeguards for future criminal activity and continue doing criminal activity as the cost of doing business, and makes it clear to every eBay employee that the idea of terrorizing innocent people and obstructing investigations is perfectly fine and shall result in such at most a small fine.

And.... Wenig the CEO is not in prison for this

[DeplorableCodeMonkey]

They were acting at his orders. Not sending him to prison is on the same level as letting a mafia leader off because he told his made men "just go deal with that guy for me" but "didn't specify how."

Even if he was horrified by their specific methods and didn't condone it, he sicced those guys on them. No different than a dog owner who doesn't understand how dangerous their dog is and sics the dog on someone for illegal reasons.

Re:

[christoban]

They tried, not enough evidence he knew of any criminal activity.

corporate personhood

[Iamthecheese]

Imagine a billionaire doing this and only being fined for it. Never mind, that happens too.

$57 Million exit package!

[blahbooboo]

eBay CEO Wenig given $57 million in his eBay exit package. Sounds like justice was not done...

Re:

[udin]

Perhaps the inevitable civil suit will include Wenig specifically, and a number like $57 million sounds about right for his contribution.

A real-life Gavin Belson

[VeryFluffyBunny]

Wenig sounds like the character from Silicon Valley, Gavin Belson, was at least partly based on him. If he weren't rich & powerful, he'd be sitting in jail right now. Instead, he makes his minions fall on their swords & he'll probably collect a bonus in excess of $3 million after this. I'm surprised eBay's lawyers didn't argue that this was free speech, protected under the first amendment.

Maybe they should have included

[wakeboarder]

those items in their employee training: "don't send cockroaches to people"

How about the victim?

[sentiblue]

I've seen numerous articles about how the assholes got thrown in jail and this article talks about how eBay pays fine. What about the victim? Aren't they supposed to be compensated for the terror they've endured for such a long time? I imagine it should be around 100M.

3 million?

[Hoi Polloi]

For 3 million please feel free to send me bugs

Jailtime?

[Holi]

So the employees who actually did this are facing jailtime right?

Crazy

[SuperDre]

3 million, because some morons send some not so nice stuff. Wow, another couple not having to work for the rest of their lives. But you can expect that from bloggers.