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As far as I know the iCloud backup are unencrypted so law enforcement can just request a backup of those instead.

You're not up-to-date and your language is not exact:

1. Your backups are encrypted in transit and at rest. You have a key, Apple also has one.

2. You can optionally ask Apple to get rid of its key to your backup. (https://support.apple.com/en-us/108756)

In other words, the parent is correct: by default it's not encrypted against Apple (no e2ee).

It's encrypted, period. Apple having the key doesn't make it plain text.

It depends on your threat model. Against Apple (forced to give the info) it is effectively plain text.

That's why we use the term end-to-end encrypted.

Yes, which is exactly what I wrote in brackets. Still got downvoted.