This only makes sense for non-CSAM data and/or premptive surveillance/policing. Proper criminals/terrorists will evade this by either ... uhm ... disabling this, network filtering this, using Android or no phone at all for their criminal activities... at the very least once you put this pressure on the "market" for a while.

Few people have access to the databases. I would bet quite a bit, this will be used for marking possible offenders of all sorts of crimes and "crimes", e.g. having ISIS propaganda material on your phone, or leaked data. Sometimes you may not even know files to be on your phone. Try exploring Telegram's nearby groups with image autodownload for groups activated and see what happens to your "share recent files" dialoge... It's all porn and nazi memes now!

Overall, I am happy Apple admitted this ultimately, because I was conflicted about buying into the ecosystem for the recent hardware appeal. Not conflicted anymore. Not at all. It's Linux/ASOP or ~~die~~ get stressed out. No M1 benchmark or fancy watch health features can make up for the chronic knot in my stomach using Apple's products; die Schere im Kopf . Hope I find a low latency pen input tablet runnig FOSS Android or Linux, too, as I feel uneasy about journaling or drawing on my iPad now. Thanks Apple, I truly hate you too <3