Early on, claims were simply thrown out due to "state secrets," presented in sealed folders only to the judge. Over time, the lawyers and organizations gained experience (a la Minesweeper) and got more substantive rejections from judges. The first win was with Nicholas Merrill, about five years in, though it took another three or four years for the gag order preventing him from talking about it to also be lifted: http://www.aclu.org/national-security/doe-v-holder and http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/08/nsl-gag-order-lifte...

So speaking with those sorts of lawyers? Who have won fights against this secret system through a public court of law? Yep, those exist.

Keep in mind, those we disagree with within the federal government aren't malicious or evil. They think they're protecting us, and they think they're acting lawfully. It's therefore reasonable to me that they see themselves as bound by the legal system because otherwise, how can they think of themselves as acting lawfully? And as much as the legal system has been stacked in their favor, when they lose, they likely abide by those rulings against them. At least, that's my read out of how much effort those folks put into (successfully) updating the law to reauthorize their behavior when we get a rare win.

Now, our take is that the legal system has been grossly abused to carve out all of their current authority on surveillance. But that's where I think they're coming from.

This is a great response, except for the fact that it's completely irrelevant, because it doesn't tell you what would happen. Courts order things that are illegal all the time, and they don't always get stayed.

If they were served with a court order they felt was illegal that had not been stayed, could not get it stayed pending appeal, etc, would they siphon the data (or turn over data), or would they take contempt/jail?

If the answer isn't the latter, than the rest, IMHO, doesn't matter. I'm not saying they should, mind you, i'm saying i don't believe they are really better than anyone else here.

The same question should be raised about other countries.

They will, eventually, be asked to siphon off user data in various countries (and not oddball third world dictatorships, instead, large EU based and other countries). Will they do it, or will they block those countries/risk arrest?

I think this answers the important question in the article, which is whether DuckDuckGo have received any of these requests.

now have a say in whether such actions can be taken by the NSA and whether they are unconstitutional are not?

We all have a say to the extent that we cooperate or not with requests like that, I don't find their preparations laughable at all. What do you expect them to do in response to the possibility of FISA requests?

I wonder if Google talked with those lawyers too…