Ex-eBay exec pleads guilty to harassing Ina and David Steiner | Hacker News Reader

Ex-eBay exec pleads guilty to harassing Ina and David Steiner

theguardian.com

161 pointsdanso64 comments

There’s a really good This American Life episode about people like this called Petty Tyrant https://www.thisamericanlife.org/419/petty-tyrant

This guy is a school maintenance manager that psychologically tortures all his employees and puts explosives on their cars.

eBay exec seems like another level. Does the episode have examples of people throwing away their c-suite jobs?

No, just bombs!

Executive worship, here..?

Its baffling to me how petty these executives got. You're an executive of a publicly traded company and your biggest concern is a couple running a blog?

They could have easily ignored them and no one would have noticed. Crazy.

Psychologically, a big part of how they became a successful executive might be an obsession with controlling...

I think it calls into the question what the definition of success is, as an executive.

Plenty of these people are stumbling through their day with no meaningful contributions, and if the larger organization does okay, everyone assumes they're performing.

Are they?

Plenty of managers and executives go off on some stupid tangent and actively harm the organizations they mange. Being a harmless kind of incompetent is worth something. Maybe not what these kinds of guys get paid, but still something.

You see this a lot in very rigid bureaucratic organizations where you "need" to have a body in the org chart because of the rules. The people who just bumble about harmlessly wind up managing things that don't need management, the box gets checked and everyone goes home happy.

Your comment reminds me of this quote:

> I divide my officers into four classes as follows: the clever, the industrious, the lazy, and the stupid. Each officer always possesses two of these qualities. Those who are clever and industrious I appoint to the General Staff. Use can under certain circumstances be made of those who are stupid and lazy. The man who is clever and lazy qualifies for the highest leadership posts. He has the requisite and the mental clarity for difficult decisions. But whoever is stupid and industrious must be got rid of, for he is too dangerous.

https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/978019182...

The original Staff Engineer!

A "successful career" that our culture elevates as a path that will be good for you doesn't always fulfill the needs in your life that you truly are seeking. Usually that path doesn't even give you the space to figure that out.

You end up in a situation where your desires don't match your environment and trying to get whatever you're truly missing takes abhorrent shapes.

Great insight. There's no substitute for intrinsic motivation, and I've become more suspicious as I've gotten older of how business culture applies the "success" label over and over on stuff to entice people.

One thing that's so easy to kind of mentally ignore is that every single person - politician, executive, or janitor is just another person like we all are. And that comes with good-sides and bad-sides of humanity.

Another similar example that struck a chord for me was the Snowden leaks showing the NSA were trading peoples nudes/sexual pics at work. [1] One of the biggest arguments people apathetic towards privacy make is something along 'the [e.g.] NSA doesn't care about your [e.g.] tits' - maybe true, maybe not - but the humans who actually make up this entity? Oh yes they most certainly do.

[1] - https://www.newsweek.com/snowden-claims-nsa-workers-circulat...

Did Snowden's leaks prove this, or was it simply reported by him?

In any case, I believe his report on this matter was accurate/truthful.

I would totally collect and trade shots of peoples' "O face" if I worked there.

One would think that isn’t the kind of character flaw one would want to reveal to potential future employers. You admit that you can not be trusted with private information.

Sssh. Relax, pumpkin. My career is secure, but sincerely, thank you for your concern. It is honestly touching.

Any "potentially future employer", or employee, for that matter, must have a sense of humor, otherwise, it won't be a fit.

Stealing photos of people's private lives and passing them around isn't humorous. In some cases, such as teens at schools, it has caused the victims to commit suicide.

Even if you don't care if your photos were leaked, that doesn't give you a right to victimize others.

1) I didn't joke about that, but about being an NSA agent trading inappropriate pictures.

2) I agree that it's an obscene joke. My humor tends to the gallows and tends to get me in trouble, particularly with those who don't have one

3) but you know what's even more obscene? NSA's warrantless mass surveillance. NSA analysts trading pictures. A joke about it is not the thing.

4) That's an argument against literally any joke. To generalize your argument: "thing isn't funny because bad things happen". "It's not funny to joke about chickens crossing roads because unexpected animal crossings cause thousands of deaths every year!" That's you.

Shhh. Relax, pumpkin. You’re winding yourself up over the mildest of criticism.

You do have a sense of humor! You shouldn't suppress it so much

> orchestrated by members of eBay’s executive leadership team after the newsletter published an article about a lawsuit filed by eBay accusing Amazon of poaching its sellers, authorities said.

Is this kinda thing covered in the meeting minutes? "I move that we send death threats to the couple." "Seconded!" "ok, all in favor?" "Aye!" "motion approved. ok, now on to 'new business'..."

It sounds like it was highly organised to me

Creepy ol Pierre Omidyar outfit ebay at it again...

> "James Baugh, of San Jose, California, who was eBay’s senior director of safety & security, and David Harville, of New York City, was eBay’s director of global resiliency, are charged with conspiracy to commit cyberstalking and conspiracy to tamper with witnesses. The other former eBay employees charged are Stephanie Popp, former senior manager of global intelligence; Brian Gilbert, former senior manager of special operations for eBay’s Global Security Team; Stephanie Stockwell, former manager of eBay’s Global Intelligence Center; and Veronica Zea, a former eBay contractor who worked as an intelligence analyst in the Global Intelligence Center."

EBay, your go-to site for fencing stolen goods online, known for running massive tax avoidance schemes as well, had some internal cinematic goon squad operation. Basically the Streisand Effect. The fish rots from the head down, of course.

https://www.bostonmagazine.com/news/2021/12/02/ebay-ecommerc...

>EBay, your go-to site for fencing stolen goods online, known for running massive tax avoidance schemes as well,

Lolwut?

A giant eCommerce platform that keeps records of listings and transactions going back god knows how long is the last place anyone with a brain is trying to fence stolen goods or dodge taxes.

eBay has plenty of problems but stolen goods and taxes aren't one of them.

Well, here's how at least one tax avoidance scheme works. eBay and Amazon deny wrongdoing, though:

https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/amazon-ebay-face-scrutiny-over-vat...

Here's another nice example: a 19-yr career of selling stolen shoplifted items on eBay that netted $3.8 million. Looks like eBay and PayPal got their cut?

https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/03/us/kim-richardson-ebay-federa...

These are not easily trackable items - look on eBay for things like electric toothbrushes and baby formula. Where do you think the sellers got that stuff from? The shoplifting rings that run amok in major US cities are not selling that stuff on the streetcorner, after all. Most are not getting caught.

Story time.

I had a phone stolen many years ago. I set a lock screen message, "hey, return the phone and I'll give you a reward, it's locked".

Nothing. For about a month.

Then some guy calls me. "Hey, so I bought this phone on eBay and when I got it I saw your message. So I was scammed. But uh, hey, since you probably had insurance, would it be possible for you to unlock it so it's not now two of us who have lost out?"

Admired his chutzpah. Said "how do I know you didn't steal it?" etc. In the end I said I wouldn't do that. So, he reaches out to the seller, asks for a refund. Seller refuses.

So he escalates. "Actually, I wasn't asking, I was demanding. See, I have the original owner's info now, and will send him the listing, and all of your info. Refund me, or I give it all to him." Seller refunds him, and he gives me the info anyway.

I see my phone listing. IMEI is the same, but two digits transposed. Enough that it won't show up on a search. Enough that he has plausible deniability. Failed the IMEI validity check. Seller is about ten minutes from me. I go to his other listings.

Holy shit.

Approximately fifty iPhones and Samsungs. All with the same IMEI transposition. Approximately a quarter describe that the phones are activation locked, but the rest don't.

Oh, and all the listings. "Does not include charger. Does not include headphones. Does not include cables. Does not include accessories."

I continue scrolling. Oh, look, this guy is also selling about forty or so Macbooks.

Guess what? None of them come with a charger either, or any accessories.

So I reach out to the local cops.

"Well, he is probably not the person who stole your phone, just someone else."

"I'm fairly sure knowingly selling stolen goods is also a crime."

"How can you say that they're stolen?"

"Well, absence of chargers, etc., would probably indicate that..."

"..."

They did nothing.

I resisted the urge to drive by his home and sugar his gas tank. Barely.

Anyway, anecdotally, plenty of people fence things on eBay. Admittedly that might not be because they're stupid, but because they know local law enforcement doesn't care.

Turo around here is being used to launder drug money. Chrysler 300Cs being "rented" out for weeks on end at $600/day. It works well because you don't even lose use of the vehicle, just have one of your customers pay Turo for "rental" with money you gave them.

> IMEI is the same, but two digits transposed. Enough that it won't show up on a search. Enough that he has plausible deniability. Failed the IMEI validity check

What's the point here? Who requires an IMEI but doesn't care if it is valid?

How do you launder money through Turo? You can't pay Turo with an envelope full of cash.

For the actual owner: if you search your IMEI, it won't show up. For the seller, "I didn't meeeeean to make a mistake, I certainly wasn't trying to hide it from its rightful owner".

No, you can't. But you can give several customers envelopes of cash, and have them pay you $600/day to "use" your car with less red flags than trying to deposit several thousands of dollars into an account.

> Harville flew to Boston from California and bought tools with a plan to break into the couple’s garage and install a GPS tracker on their car, prosecutors say.

This is batshit insanity.

sounds like garden-variety sociopathy or psychopathy.

I have a manager that used to work at eBay that is literally the worst manager I've ever had in my life. I wonder if there was a certain culture there?

Sounds like it. Toxic management trinkles all the way down throughout the company.

This is really an outrageous, unethical, disproportionate response to a negative article, what kind of psychos are working at eBay?

The same as elsewhere. The fact that he is an eBay employee is irrelevant.

Ebay seems like a unique company. I don't know if they still do this but at one point they were using web sockets to port scan customers networks.

I think this kind of psycho is the norm in the upper echelon of government and business.

We shouldn't think it is only eBay that is rotten.

If this was the norm, society would have collapsed long ago

I think the length of time it has taken for our society to collapse is a testament to the quality of civilization we destroyed (are destroying).

What collapse? Information and science is being preserved; trust is so high that we're all willing to accept numbers in a database as being money; kids are being educated now much better than I was.

Why? I sense assumption that decency at the top is required for society to function.

Counterpoints would be (sadly):

a. most of the history is wars.

b. Slavery was a norm for a very very long time.

c. North Korea.

It seems as simplistic to say it's the norm as it is to say it's an isolated case.

Why not just prosecute where there is evidence of wrongdoing.

None of the perpetrators of the 1985 bombing in Philadelphia - committed by police - ever got hauled in front of a court [1]. Abuse of power rarely gets punished if you are high enough in the chain.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1985_MOVE_bombing

Richard Helms destroyed documents regarding the CIA and their work in torturing US citizens and died and free man.

> what kind of psychos are working at eBay?

People who presumably got rejected by Amazon for being too evil even for them...

I thought they go to Oracle :)

Only if they're lawyers

The same sort that are peppered throughout society. Working at eBay just meant they likely had access to more funds than the folks that stalk people and call the new jobs to harass them or get them fired.

The same ones that work at Salesforce. [1]

(The former CEO was either blind to the activities of his direct reports, condoned their actions, or actively participated in criminal behavior. All are disqualifying offenses.)

[1] https://www.salesforce.com/company/leadership/bios/bio-wenig...

What do you expect from a company that runs a superbowl commercial that attacks space exploration, for no apparent reason or connection with their company?

This whole story is wild to me, having worked previously at a different company which was also a frequent target of criticism on the blog run by the victims.

Sure, we definitely used to eye-roll at some articles. But my ass would've been fired in 5 seconds for even sending them an email, let alone anything beyond that.

> Wenig was not criminally charged, has denied any knowledge of the harassment campaign, and his lawyers have asked that the Steiners’ claims against him be dismissed.

Call me crazy, but I feel like the guy who started the whole thing ("take her down") should face some punishment.

> charged for harassing the Boston duo

This is a nitpick, but they live(d?) in Natick. I live in a suburb of Boston and Natick is way farther out than where I sit typing this.

Then again I swear I've seen places in Maine calling themselves the Boston whatever company, so what do I know.

>I live in a suburb of Boston and Natick is way farther out than where I sit typing this.

Natick is pretty undeniably a suburb of Boston unless you want to engage in "anything outside I95 is irreverent boondocks" type snobbery which people of the immediate "Boston, the adjacent cities and their wealthiest suburbs" are somewhat known for.

>Then again I swear I've seen places in Maine calling themselves the Boston whatever company, so what do I know.

Calling Portland, Nashua, Kittery or whatever "a Boston suburb" is a statement about people, not geography.

> Natick is pretty undeniably a suburb of Boston

That's my point. It's a suburb of Boston. It's not Boston. Call them a Natick duo. Credit where credit it due.

> unless you want to engage in "anything outside I95 is irreverent boondocks" type snobbery

Just the opposite. I don't like how all the towns outside the city get lumped in with the city. Non-local news makes it sound like the entire eastern half of the state is Boston, but there's more to it than that.

> "anything outside I95 is irreverent boondocks" type snobbery

Don't worry, those folks just pass the snobbery down towards those of us who live outside I495.

Natick appears to be part of the Greater Boston area: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_Boston

The real travesty here is that every single eBay executive above the one who gave the order to "take her down" hasn't been indicted on criminal charges. They will never face justice for the criminal organization they created.

Did they think they would get away with it or did it just become a game? I assume in the US, the punishment for this sort of thing is pretty severe?

I wonder if some people around 2016-2018 felt they had free rein to do whatever because so much other crazy stuff was going on.

Previous discussions:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31162492 20220424: 11 comments

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31087766 20220419: 2 comments

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30712531 20220317: 7 comments

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29448672 20211205: 25 comments

> It's basically "Big Corporate Giant Hires Paramilitary Firm to Terrorize Private Citizens".

I genuinely do not understand these kinds of situations. Like, I've been at companies where we have well know critics and like...we know what they say and if they suffer a misfortune people might think that's funny - but we're working on the thing we are working on! I just can't imagine my boss coming to me and telling me to setup an "op" on one of our well-known-angry-in-public-customers.

I say "these kinds of situations" because, ofc, this thing seems to come up regularly? I remember the Uber exec who stalked a woman who was assaulted (raped?) by a driver. People in the tech industry seem weirdly enabling of petty hateful stalker behavior.

> People in the tech industry seem weirdly enabling of petty hateful stalker behavior

I wonder if it's because it's become so normalized to collect so much personal data all the time. Arguably a lot of us are enabling our companies to spy on people constantly, so it's not a stretch to imagine people are ok with weird stalker behavior.

Headline is literally wrong. I notice that every media outlet has gone to great pains to label the perpetrators as ex-eBay executive.

This seems to dodge the fact they committed their crimes while in the employ of eBay.

This does make me wonder if this is completely isolated and just a few bad apples or something more widespread. I know of a few other complaints of harassment from security at big tech companies which i initially dismissed because they come across as almost fantasy.

Considering the complete psychos we're dealing with here its lucky Devin Wenig's message of “Take her down,” wasn't interpreted differently.

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