It's much harder to say "I will defy you and in the process cost 10k+ people their jobs without them having any say or knowledge of this".

There's no way the govt. would do anything more than skewer (or attempt to) a few sacrificial lambs for violating a gag order. There's no political win otherwise.

"The US government threatened to fine Yahoo $250,000 a day if it refused to hand over user data to the National Security Agency, according to court documents unsealed on Thursday."

"The size of the daily fine was set to double every week that Yahoo refused to comply, the documents show."

Two years ago

How do you defend yourself from secret orders issued by secret courts that forbid defending yourself? What is this, mafia or the government ?

"Yahoo took its case to the foreign intelligence surveillance court, also known as the Fisa court, which oversees requests for surveillance orders in national security investigations. The secretive Fisa court provides the legal authorities that underpin the US government’s controversial surveillance programmes. Yahoo lost its case, and an appeal."

So, enjoy the added protection from nation states of low uptake if you're using it. :)