>What good is e2ee if Apple employees can just VNC into your phone like another commenter said?
That would be the same regardless of whether you were using icloud or syncthing...
The commenter hasn't actually linked any sort of proof or citation (at the time I'm writing this), and assuming it exists at all, it requires you to accept the inbound connection in the first place. My guess is they're extremely confused about the new switch control function that allows remote access, not some nefarious Apple backdoor like you're insinuating.