Now-Former eBay Security Team Members Charged in Bizarre Cyberstalking Campaign

They allegedly sent live cockroaches, a funeral wreath, and a bloody pig mask to the home of their targets, a Natick, Mass., couple who publish an e-commerce online newsletter, in an apparent retaliation for an article perceived as critical of their now-former employer, eBay.

The six defendants included some of top members of eBay's security team: James Baugh, 45, former senior director of safety & security; David Harville, 48, former director of global resiliency; Stephanie Popp, 32, former senior manager of global intelligence; Stephanie Stockwell, 26, former manager of eBay's global intelligence center; Brian Gilbert, 51, former senior manager of special operations for eBay's global security team; and Veronica Zea, 26, a former contractor for intelligence.

According to the US District Attorney's Office in Massachusetts, after the newsletter ran a story about a court case involving eBay in August 2019, two eBay executives sent text messages that it was time to "take down" the newsletter's editor.

The six ex-eBay employees face cyber-stalking and witness-tampering conspiracy charges. Baugh, who lives in San Jose, Calif., and Harville, of New York, were arrested today.

Gilbert, who is a former police captain in Santa Clara, Calif., also was to offer to "help" the couple stop the online and other harassment in a ploy to influence more favorable articles about eBay in the newsletter. It wasn't until four of the defendants went to the victims' home to set up surveillance — a plot that would entail breaking into their garage and planting a GPS tracker on the victims' car — that they were found out.

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