How Did Intelligence Community Infiltrate Big Tech?

Recent lawsuits and disclosures such as the ongoing "Twitter Files" series have revealed the degree to which Big Tech and social media firms are allied with U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies and staffed with former government officials – and the presence there of so many operatives is no coincidence.

But how did companies founded with visions of connecting the globe allow their ranks to be permeated by contingents of former federal officials whose previous posts were sometimes at odds with those ideals?