US prosecutors have launched a criminal investigation into whether eBay employees nicked confidential information from classified ad website Craigslist.

According to Reuters s eBay was trying to build a rival service at the time. The pair have been hitting each other with handbags for years in civil court over allegations that online giant eBay took a stake in Craigslist and then misappropriated confidential information while it secretly planned its own classifieds site.

Now prosecutors have subpoenaed seeks information regarding several eBay personalities, including founder and Chairman Pierre Omidyar and Joshua Silverman, the former Skype chief executive who served as eBay's representative on Craigslist's board.

eBay spokeswoman, Amanda Miller, said the company would cooperate in any inquiry related to the disputes with Craigslist but added that the online auctioneer believes that Craigslist's allegations against eBay are without merit.
Many of the requests in the subpoena match word for word language in another civil lawsuit filed by Craigslist against eBay.

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