Presumably a number of people at Google had access to the orders, if only to implement the government's surveillance.
What's always baffling to me is how seldom stuff like this is leaked -- all it takes is one person with the right access, conscience and the technical skills to work out how to siphon off their own unofficial copy, then put that unofficial copy anonymously on the internet when the appeals to do it legally have been exhausted.
Manning was in a different position because he was military. Putting your signature on that recruiting document both increases the legal expectations on your conduct and decreases the rights you have after you break the rules.
But you may be surprised to find how little respect LEOs have for your rights if they decide to target you. Once you become a target, they have one job- to hunt you down and throw you in jail. The training, culture, and expectation is that of a predator (and you are the mouse).
Knowing something of many secrets that aren't even protected by an order and how little they often spread... it's no surprise to me.
Consider how often it happens that someone will collapse in public and many people will pass before someone renders aid. It's easy to feel like you're not responsible for preventing harm, especially when you're part of a big organization and the harm is being caused by a government.
The penalties for violating a gag order can be very high indeed. Research "National Security Letters" Or think of Aaron Scwartz. If you get on the bad side of LE, they can hunt and harrass you for years.
There was one service which suggested people/organizations report in once per week that they had NOT received a NSL. Presumably when a company did not report this, it would suggests that they had. I'm not sure what happened to the service.
What's always baffling to me is how seldom stuff like this is leaked -- all it takes is one person with the right access, conscience and the technical skills to work out how to siphon off their own unofficial copy, then put that unofficial copy anonymously on the internet when the appeals to do it legally have been exhausted.