Ina Steiner and her husband David, the Natick, Massachusetts couple who spent five years fighting eBay in court over a harassment and stalking campaign aimed at silencing their reporting, have settled their lawsuit for nearly $50 million, according to the Boston Globe. Ina Steiner said the outcome brings a measure of vindication but has not erased the fear that has shadowed the couple since 2019.
Under the settlement announced on July 27, eBay agreed to pay the Steiners $46.15 million, while former chief executive Devin Wenig will personally pay $2 million and two other former executives will together pay $550,000, the Globe reported. Charities will also benefit, receiving $6 million from eBay and $1 million from Wenig. Notably, the settlement contains no confidentiality clause, meaning Ina and David Steiner remain free to discuss the case publicly, a detail their lawyers and the couple have described as unusual for a corporate settlement of this size.
The case grew out of a bizarre and frightening campaign waged against the Steiners in 2019 by people who worked at eBay. According to court records cited by the Globe, seven former eBay employees faced criminal charges after sending the couple threatening messages and disturbing deliveries, including live spiders, a bloody pig mask and a funeral wreath. The harassers also attempted to attach a tracking device to the Steiners' car. The campaign, prosecutors and the couple say, was launched after Wenig, then eBay's chief executive, complained about coverage and reader comments on Ecommercebytes, the e-commerce trade publication Ina Steiner runs.
A Sense of Vindication, Not Closure
Ina Steiner told the Globe it is still too early to say whether she and her husband have found real closure. "Just the fact that we're still trying to recall certain instances in this case means that it still haunts us," David Steiner said. "It's still very difficult to sleep." Ina Steiner added that the ordeal has left a lasting mark on how she views trust itself: "If I learned anything over the past seven years, it is not to trust anything. It's still taking me time to process the fact that this is over."
The couple's home is now fitted with security cameras, and the Globe reported they remain hypervigilant, growing nervous even at the arrival of an unexpected package, a lingering reminder of the deliveries once used to intimidate them.
Still, Ina Steiner said she considers the broader goal of the lawsuit accomplished. Back in 2021, when the couple first filed their civil suit, she told the Globe, "the reason we're suing is we don't want it to happen to anybody else... It has to be known what was done to us." Reflecting on that statement this week, she said, "That was the overriding theme and it guided us in every decision that we made. And for that, I think, mission accomplished." She pointed to sustained news coverage and a 2024 documentary about the case, "Whatever It Takes," now streaming on Amazon Prime, as evidence that their story has been told widely enough to serve as a deterrent to other companies.
Pushing For a Massachusetts Shield Law
Beyond their own case, the Steiners are now using their platform to push for legal reforms in Massachusetts. They are urging state lawmakers to adopt a reporter shield law recently advanced by the state Senate, which would protect journalists from being forced to disclose confidential sources in court. According to the Globe, more than 40 states already have such protections, but Massachusetts does not.
The issue is personal for the Steiners: two years into their lawsuit, eBay's lawyers sought to compel them to reveal confidential sources used in their reporting on the company, a demand their legal team fought off. Ina Steiner said the episode had a chilling effect on their journalism, explaining that sources grew afraid to come forward once they believed eBay might be able to identify them if the information leaked. "It's a chilling effect," she said. "And that Massachusetts, of all the states in America, should be last when it comes to this is incredible to me."
The couple is also calling for tougher antistalking laws in Massachusetts. Unlike California's statute, Massachusetts law does not allow for punitive damages in stalking cases, a gap David Steiner argues removes a key deterrent against wealthy individuals or large corporations. "The civil stalking laws in Massachusetts, I don't believe are strong enough," he told the Globe. "We want to see some sort of financial or economic obligation to the victim, because what better to keep this from happening again?"
That gap became central to the Steiners' own case. US District Judge Patti Saris, who oversaw the lawsuit, ruled in 2024 that the couple could seek punitive damages under California's stalking law rather than Massachusetts', a decision eBay had planned to appeal. The Globe reported that nearly all of the roughly $500 million in damages the Steiners had sought during litigation hinged on that ruling.
Why the Case Settled Before Trial
The Steiners told the Globe they had hoped a trial would further expose the culpability of senior eBay executives, including Wenig. But one factor pushing them toward settlement was the realization that much of the evidence gathered during discovery, including some of the roughly 68,000 documents turned over by eBay, would likely have been ruled inadmissible after objections from the company's lawyers. "If we had gone to trial, I think a fraction of the discovery... many of them would not have been allowed," David Steiner said.
Wenig has maintained he was unaware of the harassment campaign while serving as CEO and said he would have stopped it had he known. An outside law firm hired by eBay found that Wenig's "tone was improper and unacceptable" but concluded there was no evidence he directed or knew that criminal acts would occur, according to the Globe's reporting.
Documents produced during the litigation also pointed to a broader pattern, according to the Globe, showing that corporate security departments across Silicon Valley had grown larger and more aggressive in monitoring perceived threats to their companies, a trend the Steiners' case helped bring into public view.
