In a society of free press and mass media, everyone found out about the eBay stalking scandal quickly and through many different news sources. It made it on Fortune's list of "The Biggest Business Scandals of 2020," which appeared as the third search result in Google. Type "eBay stalking scandal" into Google or YouTube and you will receive thousands of results, from big newspapers to obscure news blogs. In our very outspoken society, everyone had an opinion of the scandal, most if not all which were negative.
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| Roberta Matuson, a Forbes Contributor |
I agree with the Roberta Matuson's points in the article. I believe that business and corporate America in general gets a bad rap because the news is flooded with corporate scandals and stories of people in business just for the money. While this is not the case for some businesses, it is what the media chooses to emphasize because people are more likely to read or watch or listen to a story that catches their attention in a bad way than one of a company doing something good. I believe that people are also tired of hearing about companies claiming that they are ethical and sustainable because most companies say the same things, and we know that they are probably stretching the truth. Just look at eBay. eBay was named one of the most ethical companies in the world and at the same time had a team of employees ruin the lives of an innocent couple in the most horrendous way simply because they disagreed with what they had to say about the company. Stories like this are why people do not trust large corporations. They have so much power and wealth that they can get away with these things without much consequence. Companies have entire public relations departments whose job is to keep positive relations with the press and protect the company's reputation in times of crisis. Indeed corporations mess up, and they hire bad employees who misrepresent the entire corporation. However, I believe that corporations need to worry more about living their values than saying their values.
I believe that not even corporate America, but society as a whole needs to start living with integrity. I know so many people who claim to hate Jeff Bezos but then buy everything on Amazon, or say that they care about the environment and do a lot of online shopping and order takeout often. It is better to say nothing that to lie.
Another commentator who I found interesting is a YouTuber and eBay seller names Joe Demarco, also knowns as "The Crazy New York Driver." Here is his video reaction to the eBay stalking scandal, titled "eBay Talk- My Reaction To 6 eBay Executives Stalking People and Updates."
Even though Joe Demarco is just an average guy, he has strong ties to eBay and great commentary. When he first heard of the case, he claimed: "I can't remember ever being this shocked in my life. That a multimillion dollar company would stoop this low to do this kind of think to people who were just going out there and voicing their opinions." He believes that the Steiners were innocent people who were just voicing opinion about eBay online, which they have a right to do in this country. Demarco himself even knows a lot of people who have had negative experiences with eBay. He called the employees involved "pieces of human trash.," and claimed that the executives "received a golden parachute" from eBay.
What made this case hit home for Joe Demarco was that he was stalked by someone on eBay for eight years, and eBay still has done nothing about it. He received numerous attacks from various fake accounts (all run by the same person), and doxxed his home address, among other things. The incident that most affected Demarco was when his stalker claimed on social media that Demarco was one of the people involved in the reenactment of the death of George Floyd. Unfortunately for Joe Demarco, one of the racists involved was named Joe Demarco as well. According to Demarco, there are many other people being stalked and harassed by other eBay users. Therefore, when the eBay stalking scandal came out, it really caught Demarco's attention. He wanted to use this case as a gateway into getting the US Attorney's attention, so they can resolve his stalking case and become more aware of cyberstalking. Demarco interestingly claimed that it is no wonder why so many people are being stalked on eBay when their security team is across the country stalking innocent people.
I think that it is terrifying how other people are being stalked on eBay. Of course, these people are not eBay employees and the stalking is not nearly to the extent as it was in the case, but it is scary nonetheless. eBay's website has a security center that allows users to protect their information, contact customer service, report a fake email, resolve a problem, and take certain steps if they have been hacked, along with many other resources. On their CSR page, they even have a small writeup about data protection. However, from what I heard in this video, which was taken pretty recently in June 2020, it does not sound like eBay is doing a very good job at protecting their users from online threats. This ties back into what I said earlier about companies claiming to do all of these wonderful things when in reality they are not living up to their values. I am not saying that eBay is not living up to their values, as the stalking scandal involved only a few employees and Demarco's stalking case could be uncommon, but in general it is an issue that companies need to be more aware of.
The part of the case's outcome that angered people the most was the fact that both Wenig and Wymer both got new, high-paying jobs after leaving eBay. Wenig ended up on the Board of Directors of General Motors, and Wymer landed a job as the chief executive of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Silicon Valley. "Mary Barra, GM's chief executive, called the cyberstalking scandal 'regrettable' but noted 'it didn't involve any GM business." "The chair of the board said the nonprofit was 'aware' of what happened at eBay, but believes Mr. Wymer is 'a leader of integrity' and was the unanimous choice for the job.'"
It blows my mind that companies would want to hire executives even involved in such a horrendous case. These men were all over the news for being associated with the harassment case, so they already have a bad reputation. Why would a public company want to hire someone with such a reputation? I even recall reading a lot of content from various sources that talked about how Wenig was not even a great CEO before the harassment case. It makes me question the ethics of General Motors and the Boys & Girls Clubs of Silicon Valley. Unethical companies hire unethical people, and it is clear that both Wenig and Wymer are unethical people. While I do not know if this is truth, I suspect that both men had friends on the Boards of these companies because I cannot really comprehend why a company would want to hire someone who was known for being involved in something so horrific. Since both got away facing minor consequences, I bet they did not learn their lesson and therefore could make unethical decisions in their new companies.
Sources:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/26/technology/ebay-cockroaches-stalking-scandal.html
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