DOJ sues eBay for selling ‘rolling coal’ devices; fines could hit $2 billion

www.cnbc.com DOJ sues eBay for selling ‘rolling coal’ devices; fines could hit $2 billion

Rolling coal is the practice of tampering with a vehicle's emissions control system, causing it to spew black clouds of sooty exhaust.

Fuck Cars @lemmy.ml DOJ sues eBay for selling ‘rolling coal’ devices; fines could hit $2 billion [article]

Fuck Cars @lemmy.world DOJ sues eBay for selling ‘rolling coal’ devices; fines could hit $2 billion [article]

News @lemmy.world DOJ sues eBay for selling ‘rolling coal’ devices; fines could hit $2 billion

45 comments

Rolling coal is the practice of installing a tampering device to pump more diesel into a vehicle’s engine than it can handle, leading it to spew out sooty black clouds of exhaust that pollute the air.

The practice is sometimes used as a form of anti-environmental protest. Coal rollers, or the drivers who engage in the action, may intentionally target Teslas, Priuses or other electric or hybrid vehicles.

Some people's dedication to being an asshole is quite astonishing. Imagine paying money just to be able to spew soot at other people's electric cars.

128
- Some people are here to ~~watch~~ make the world burn.
  
  24
- It's also a practice to used to attack other drivers, pedestrians, cyclists, motorcyclist etc by blowing black soot in your face. Its often dangerous because it creates a smoke screen where you can't even see the road.
  
  8
- Their favourite target is cyclists, as you might expect.
  
  4
- Some people are here to ~~~~watch make the world burn.
  
  1
As a person who enjoys clean air I approve of this.

83
- As a person, I approve of this.
  
  47
  
  I approve of this
  
  5
  
  As a
  
  1
  
  I approve
  
  0
- As a mammal with lungs I approve.
  
  4
The bigger the truck, the more fragile the man.

34
- It's called petromasculinity.
  
  8
  
  aka Penis Envy
  
  0
- These are the same folks who think that the pinnacle of comedy is farting as you leave a crowded room.
  
  4
Wait... Ebay is merely a marketplace where people or vendors use the platform to sell their goods.

Shouldn't the individuals be sued?

Or maybe it's because they could be in another country, so they go after the platform itself for allowing such devices to be sold?

23
- Going after the marketplace is a more efficient strategy than playing whack a mole with individual sellers.
  
  46
  
  Also being a marketplace they do have a duty to make sure that people are not selling illegal items on their platform.
  
  Because if platforms didn't could you imagine how bad the Internet would be for buying things.
  
  27
  
  The correct way would be to go after the buyers
  
  4
  
  Agreed, but I hope they go after the sellers, too.
  
  3
- Merketplaces can be held liable for third party sellers merchandise as it's ultimately up to the marketplace to chose what is allowed and prohibited to be sold.
  
  Imagine a marketplace allowed vendors to sell human slaves and the government tells that marketplace that is very much not okay stop it. If that marketplace continues allowing third party vendors to sell human slaves then that marketplace has now also broken the law along with the third party vendor and potentially even the purchaser depending on how the law was written.
  
  9
  
  Good point
  
  2
- Why not go after both?
  
  They should then request all purchases of the devices, and go after the buyers too.
  
  As a bonus, a lot of the people buying these are probably wife beaters or toxic f**wits. So, screw protecting them..
  
  5
  
  It's confusing because I kinda agree with some of your stereotyping and I'm not confident that is a good thing.
  
  2
- I agree, hitting a couple of these sellers and manufacturers with multi-million dollar fines would be fucking great. They have to go onto X and complain to their drifting buddies that the only way to support Trump would be to bail them out of jail.
  
  2
I'd love to see a bounty system for this. If I send my dashcam footage of some asshole rolling coal to the DOT I get a (untaxed) cash reward and the coal-roller gets a large fine and mandatory prius they have to drive for 3 years.

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- Then they'd realize Priuses actually haul ass from a stop and we'd start to see the first lifted Priuses with mud tires blaring twangy songs about going about life blaring twangy songs in a Prius
  
  9
  
  Prius kick ass.
  
  That is all I have to say about that
  
  3
  
  Just wait till these guys find out about Tesla's!
  
  1
  
  now that many are on their second and beyond owners, priuses are mean aggressive little things
  
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Ebay denied the charges in a public statement, saying it has blocked "more than 99.9% the listings for the products cited by the DOJ, including millions of listings each year."

A court will determine if that claim is true, but if yes, EBay as a market platform won't be liable. A 99.9% interception rate would indicate a considerable effort to prevent illicit trades.

16
- It is true. You will have your listing removed if you try to list something as an emissions defeat device. If you try a second time then your account will be banned.
  
  I listed a carb exempt factory performance ecu made by the vehicle manufacturer and it was removed for going against the tos.
  
  Although they do allow universal ecus like mega squirt. I could see performance programmers sneaking through if they avoid specific language. eBay can't know the specifics of every single item that gets listed.
  
  1
Good.

16
interesting they're not going after Amazon for the same thing

13
- Hopefully that's a "Not yet," but we'll see
  
  9
- Not yet..
  
  Sadly, some knobs will go to extreme efforts to try to impress people to be different and stand out. Stuff like this is GENUINELY an attempt to mask their insecurities
  
  1
I don't know about other states, but in Texas they don't even test diesel emissions during our annual registration / inspection. Totally ridiculous!

8
- Vehicle inspections are going away entirely in Texas in 2025.
  
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Ebay doesn't sell anything. It's just a marketplace. Why wouldn't they pursue the people and companies actually selling these devices?

1
- Do you know they're not going after them too?
  
  1