This system is likely closely related to full encrypted E2E iCloud backups: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-apple-fbi-icloud-exclusiv...
If that's true, as an iCloud user you are exactly as likely to be charged with a crime based on your photos as you were before, but you now get E2E encryption.
Obviously I'd prefer E2E without any scanning. If I wanted to upload a pirated mp3 to icloud, I wouldn't want the RIAA knocking on my door. However, given that scanning was already in place, is this a step forward?
Is this strictly true? I feel like the evidence that a photo was present on specific device is different from evidence that a photo was uploaded by a specific account (and a specific ip address probably).
It seems like it would be far easier for the government to justify a search warrant if they have evidence the photo they are looking for was on a specific device. Just having evidence that a specific account uploaded a photo seems like far shakier grounds to search a specific device, after all accounts are often stolen to be used for criminal purposes and ip addresses don't map cleanly to people or devices.
From what I’ve read the on-phone scanning only alerts after multiple photos and is designed to have a 1 in a trillion false positive rate. If the iCloud scan is similar they would have a strong case for getting a warrant based on uploads.
It's like living in the glass apartments of Yevgeny Zamyatin's We but still thinking we're preserving privacy because we put our items into an opaque box.