eBay agrees to pay $50M over cyberstalking campaign against Massachusetts

eBay Inc. on Tuesday agreed to pay roughly $50 million to a Massachusetts couple after former employees were accused of terrorizing the pair of bloggers — sending packages containing live cockroaches and spiders, a preserved fetal pig, a funeral wreath, a bloody pig Halloween mask and a book about surviving the death of a spouse.

According to a 2021 lawsuit, the deliveries were part of a 2019 harassment campaign targeting David and Ina Steiner, who cover the e-commerce industry through their newsletter. 

The lawsuit alleged the employees became angered by the Steiners’ reporting and conspired to “intimidate, threaten to kill, torture, terrorize, stalk and silence them.” The couple said they were subjected to cyberstalking, death threats and in-person surveillance.

“We hope that the size of the settlement amount will act as a deterrent to any corporation that uses their resources to intimidate journalists into compliance simply because they don’t agree with their coverage,” the couple said in a statement to FOX Business.

EBAY TO PAY $3M AFTER TARGETING MASSACHUSETTS COUPLE WITH CYBERSTALKING CAMPAIGN

FILE – People walk outside the eBay headquarters in San Jose, California, on Monday, Aug. 9, 2021. eBay was accused of engaging in a bizarre intimidation campaign against an e-commerce journalist couple. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg / Getty Images)

“I could not conceive that a company I had been covering for the past two decades had tried to terrorize us into stopping our reporting,” Ina Steiner added, according to The Associated Press.

The lawsuit named former CEO Devin Wenig, former Chief Communications Officer Steve Wymer and former Senior Vice President Wendy Jones, all of whom have since left the company but were not criminally charged. In 2020, federal prosecutors also charged six other former eBay employees and one contractor in connection with the scheme, all of whom ultimately pleaded guilty to their roles. 

The campaign reportedly lasted several weeks, beginning with threatening direct messages on social media before escalating into anonymous deliveries. 

According to the lawsuit, employees sent pornographic magazines addressed to David Steiner to a neighbor’s home in an attempt to defame the couple within their community. They also tried to plant a GPS tracking device on the couple’s vehicle, the suit said.

Ina Steiner said she did not initially know who was behind the harassment or why they had been targeted.  

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David and Ina Steiner arrive at the federal courthouse for the sentencing hearings of former eBay security executives in Boston on Sept. 29, 2022. (Brian Snyder / Reuters)

Under the settlement, the Steiners will receive $48.7 million in compensation, including about $46.15 million from eBay, $2 million from former CEO Wenig, $500,000 from former executive Jones and $50,000 from former executive…