Six former eBay executives and employees charged with aggressive cyberstalking campaign targeting a couple who published an online newsletter critical of the company
This is a completely insane story, some of the stuff these people were doing (or planning to do) is ridiculous. There's a little more info in this Boston Globe article. eBay also published a...
This is a completely insane story, some of the stuff these people were doing (or planning to do) is ridiculous.
The Company noted that the internal investigation also examined what role, if any, the Company’s CEO at the time of the incident, Devin Wenig, may have had in this matter. The internal investigation found that, while Mr. Wenig’s communications were inappropriate, there was no evidence that he knew in advance about or authorized the actions that were later directed toward the blogger and her husband. However, as the Company previously announced, there were a number of considerations leading to his departure from the Company.
You've got to be fucking kidding me, just wow. Sending a decapitated animal head, porn, a book on the loss of a spouse, harassing them with private messages, attempting to break into the victim's...
You've got to be fucking kidding me, just wow. Sending a decapitated animal head, porn, a book on the loss of a spouse, harassing them with private messages, attempting to break into the victim's car and track them with GPS, lying to the police, coming up with fake "Person of Interest" reports - I've seen less crazy schemes in kid's cartoons. The Onion could publish this as their first 100% realistic story, and I'd think it's outlandish even for them.
emphasis added: So...um...separate from this totally insane story, why in the first place does eBay have a "Global Intelligence Center" large enough to need multiple layers of management plus a...
emphasis added:
James Baugh, 45, of San Jose, Calif., eBay’s former Senior Director of Safety & Security
David Harville, 48, of New York City, eBay’s former Director of Global Resiliency
Stephanie Popp, 32, of San Jose, eBay’s former Senior Manager of Global Intelligence
Stephanie Stockwell, 26, of Redwood City, Calif., the former manager of eBay’s Global Intelligence Center (GIC)
Veronica Zea, 26, of San Jose, a former eBay contractor who worked as an intelligence analyst in the GIC
Brian Gilbert, 51, of San Jose, a former Senior Manager of Special Operations for eBay’s Global Security Team
So...um...separate from this totally insane story, why in the first place does eBay have a "Global Intelligence Center" large enough to need multiple layers of management plus a team of contractors?
And why does eBay's Global Security Team have a "Special Operations" division?
"Corporate/business Intelligence" generally refers to information collection and analysis, which is typically used for risk assessment/mitigation, market research, etc., but it's not always so...
"Corporate/business Intelligence" generally refers to information collection and analysis, which is typically used for risk assessment/mitigation, market research, etc., but it's not always so mundane (see: Jules Kroll and the world of corporate intelligence), and when a company also has large financial services operations (like eBay and its subsidiaries do) said division often works hand-in-hand with their cybersecurity and cybercrime divisions as well, so there is quite a bit of crossover between them.
And if I had to guess, "Special operations" in this case probably refers to the investigators and researchers in the company who might have to do their work in the dark due to the dangers posed by those they are investigating (e.g. organized crime), might operate within legal/ethical grey areas (e.g. relying on covert surveillance, malware reverse engineering, utilizing the dark web, etc.) in order to do their job, and likely liaise and/or work closely with law enforcement.
Both eBay, and its former subsidiary Paypal (who several of my friends worked for as fraud investigators), have absolutely huge divisions dedicated to those tasks... though unfortunately it looks like some of the people employed for that at eBay chose to cross the line from operating in the grey area into the blatantly illegal. :/
Bumping this thread with a link to the charging documents where you can see a lot of the messages they sent. I've read a number of articles on this and I really don't feel like any of them quite...
Bumping this thread with a link to the charging documents where you can see a lot of the messages they sent. I've read a number of articles on this and I really don't feel like any of them quite do justice to how batshit insane and also evil this was. Would strongly suggest for anyone who followed the story.
The Wall Street Journal published an article about this today with some new info: ‘Crush This Lady.’ Inside eBay’s Bizarre Campaign Against a Blog Critic
This is a completely insane story, some of the stuff these people were doing (or planning to do) is ridiculous.
There's a little more info in this Boston Globe article.
eBay also published a statement that vaguely implicates the then-CEO Devin Wenig as encouraging the harassment: eBay Inc. Issues Statement Regarding Indictments of Previously Terminated Employees:
You've got to be fucking kidding me, just wow. Sending a decapitated animal head, porn, a book on the loss of a spouse, harassing them with private messages, attempting to break into the victim's car and track them with GPS, lying to the police, coming up with fake "Person of Interest" reports - I've seen less crazy schemes in kid's cartoons. The Onion could publish this as their first 100% realistic story, and I'd think it's outlandish even for them.
emphasis added:
So...um...separate from this totally insane story, why in the first place does eBay have a "Global Intelligence Center" large enough to need multiple layers of management plus a team of contractors?
And why does eBay's Global Security Team have a "Special Operations" division?
"Corporate/business Intelligence" generally refers to information collection and analysis, which is typically used for risk assessment/mitigation, market research, etc., but it's not always so mundane (see: Jules Kroll and the world of corporate intelligence), and when a company also has large financial services operations (like eBay and its subsidiaries do) said division often works hand-in-hand with their cybersecurity and cybercrime divisions as well, so there is quite a bit of crossover between them.
And if I had to guess, "Special operations" in this case probably refers to the investigators and researchers in the company who might have to do their work in the dark due to the dangers posed by those they are investigating (e.g. organized crime), might operate within legal/ethical grey areas (e.g. relying on covert surveillance, malware reverse engineering, utilizing the dark web, etc.) in order to do their job, and likely liaise and/or work closely with law enforcement.
Both eBay, and its former subsidiary Paypal (who several of my friends worked for as fraud investigators), have absolutely huge divisions dedicated to those tasks... though unfortunately it looks like some of the people employed for that at eBay chose to cross the line from operating in the grey area into the blatantly illegal. :/
Bumping this thread with a link to the charging documents where you can see a lot of the messages they sent. I've read a number of articles on this and I really don't feel like any of them quite do justice to how batshit insane and also evil this was. Would strongly suggest for anyone who followed the story.
The Wall Street Journal published an article about this today with some new info: ‘Crush This Lady.’ Inside eBay’s Bizarre Campaign Against a Blog Critic