It's already happening, and scans even with iCloud turned off: https://sneak.berlin/20230115/macos-scans-your-local-files-n...
> The media erroneously reported [a statement from September 2021] as Apple reversing course.
Linking to an article from December 22, 2022 in which Apple is quoted as literally saying “We have further decided to not move forward with our previously proposed CSAM detection tool for iCloud Photos.”, ie actually and literally reversing course.
If this person cannot comprehend an article, should I trust that they actually checked that what they were seeing was what they were paranoid about?
Btw, the screenshot shows an interaction with api.smoot.apple.com, which is known to be used for spotlight and related services: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8479958 ; mediaanalysisd is used for visual lookup, where macOS tries to identify landmarks and other items in an image to help you find more information about it (https://appleinsider.com/articles/23/01/21/tests-confirm-mac...).
In short, paranoid people are good to use as indicators for further investigation, but are rarely to be trusted as sole sources—even less so when they attempt to ascribe intent.
Your note about that domain is interesting though. I don't regularly use Apple devices, so I'm not particularly concerned by that anyways.