Comment by privacyking
1 month ago
Apple sells their products in oppressive regimes which force them to implement region specific features. E.g. China has their own iCloud, presumeably so it can be easily snooped on.
If they were to add this anti-CSAM feature, it is not unreasonable to think that Apple would be forced to add non-CSAM stuff to the database in these countries, e.g. anything against a local dictatorship/ etc. Adding the feature would only catch the low hanging CSAM fruit, at the cost of great privacy and probably human life. If it was going to stop CSAM once and for all, it could possibly be justified, but that's not the case.
If China can force Apple to do that stuff, then it can do that regardless of whether or not they add this feature.
Apple and others already scan peoples pictures/videos for this stuff, so your argument can be applied to what it is now.
Apples suggestion would have meant your data would be more protected as even they would not have been able to unencrypt your data.