https://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/3662a707-0af9...
Only to someone ideologically blinkered or completely ignorant of history. There are countless examples of governments achieving all sorts of highly non-straightforward things both for good and for bad. Even the CIA, which will probably not make it onto many shortlists of history's most competent governmental organizations had its successes.
What people don't understand is that it is precisely this incompetence which allows corporations to manipulate the government so well. Laws and regulations do not originate within governments. They originate from lobbyists who are working in the interest of corporations and other large financial interests.
When discussing the economy, some people will keep insisting that capitalism is the most intelligent collective system possible, yet when it comes to politics, they will make it seem like capitalism is the dumbest system in the world, utterly incompetent at implementing perverse economic agendas... So I guess the view must be that capitalism maximizes the extraction of value from every kind of activity except when those activities relate to the government?
Clearly this makes no sense. Why would capitalism's efficiency at leveraging the collective intelligence stop at politics?
"How do you know the CIA didn't kill JFK?"
On the other hand, I can totally imagine that having some support from the government itself could be a pretty significant advantage. Perhaps even enough of one to become a market leader.
With all that said, I hardly need a grand conspiracy to dislike both Google and organizations like the CIA.
I'm sure there was some input from american surveillance in the creation of a lot of modern computer tools, but this would be indirect influence at best, and the three letter agencies gambling on already existing technology at worst.