eBay Executives Sentenced to Prison for Terror Campaign Against Critics of Company

Last year, Breitbart News reported that a number of high-level eBay executives and contractors had been charged with a cyberstalking terror campaign against critics of the company by federal authorities. Now two former eBay executives have been sentenced to prison time.

In 2021, Breitbart News outlined the story of David and Ina Steiner, who were targeted and stalked by former eBay executives for publishing an online e-commerce newsletter that was critical of the Silicon Valley company. In June 2020, Breitbart News reported on the situation as federal authorities took action against the Silicon Valley attack dogs.

Now, two former eBay employees, Jim Baugh and David Harville, have been sentenced to 57 and 24 months in prison respectively for their part in the harassment campaign of David and Ina Steiner.

The first harassment incident against the Steiners took place in June 2019, when the name “Fidomaster” was spray-painted across the couple’s fence. The name refers to an anonymous commenter on their newsletter who was often critical of eBay. A few months later things began to escalate.

The Boston Globe reported:

From the Steiners’ point of view, not much happened for a few weeks after the graffiti. But on Aug. 8, 2019, they found their inboxes filling up with dozens of e-mail newsletters they hadn’t signed up for, ranging from Heather’s Irritable Bowel Syndrome News and The Satanic Temple to more disturbing fare featuring pornography and bondage. At the same time, a new Twitter account started bombarding Ina Steiner with expletive-laden taunts, she said.

Days later they received a call from a taxidermy and animal parts shop in Arizona requesting further information about the fetal pig they had allegedly ordered. The Steiners had, of course, never ordered the fetal pig. Disconcerted by the series of events they decided to call the Natick police, who sent an officer to their house to take a report.

As the officer was leaving, he noticed a package by the door. When opened it contained a bloody pig mask, the same one worn by the serial killer Jigsaw in the popular “Saw” horror movie series. Again, the Steiners had not ordered this item.

U.S. District Judge Patti Saris who imposed the sentences on Baugh and Harville said that the scehe was “hard-to-imagine” and filled by a “toxic culture” at eBay. “It was extreme and outrageous,” Saris said.

Saris ordered Baugh, who worked as eBay’s former senior director of safety and security, and Harville, the company’s former director of global resiliency, to also pay fines of $40,000 and $20,000 after they pleaded guilty to cyberstalking charges.

Read more at Reuters here.

Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan