There is a reasonably well documented underground economy of bribing Instagram employees to verify accounts (blue checkboxes) [0] and steal sought after usernames.[1]
Amazon employees have been convicted of bribery for taking $ to "leak information about the company’s search and ranking algorithms, as well as share confidential data on third-party sellers they competed with on the marketplace".[2]
If this happens at Facebook and Amazon, I can imagine it happening at Google.
[1] I did not find any citable evidence on the first page of Google, but it's something I've heard from friends that are into influencer stuff. Supported by a quote from [1]
"he decided to message someone with an interesting handle (a.k.a. username). That someone said they were able to take over that account because he worked at Instagram."
Amazon employees have been convicted of bribery for taking $ to "leak information about the company’s search and ranking algorithms, as well as share confidential data on third-party sellers they competed with on the marketplace".[2]
If this happens at Facebook and Amazon, I can imagine it happening at Google.
[0] https://mashable.com/article/instagram-verification-paid-bla...
[1] I did not find any citable evidence on the first page of Google, but it's something I've heard from friends that are into influencer stuff. Supported by a quote from [1]
"he decided to message someone with an interesting handle (a.k.a. username). That someone said they were able to take over that account because he worked at Instagram."
[2] https://www.cnbc.com/2022/02/11/former-amazon-employee-sente...