Microsoft’s decision to take on the U.S. government’s habit of stamping “Secret” on court orders demanding data stored on the company’s servers was largely motivated by business concerns, a legal expert said Thursday.

The Redmond, Wash. firm also implied that business reasons drove it to ask that a section of a 1986 law be declared unconstitutional.

“The government’s secrecy orders forbid cloud service providers from letting businesses know that the government has obtained their data,” said Brad Smith, Microsoft’s chief legal officer, in a post to a company blog yesterday. “Not surprisingly, business customers regularly convey to us their strong desire to know when the government is obtaining their data. And not surprisingly, they want the opportunity for their own lawyers to review the situation and help decide whether to turn over information or contest the issue in court.”

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