I don’t trust Apple, but I also don’t blanket distrust them. Of those three articles you posted, the only one that gives me pause is the one from 2022 where Apple was sending App Store navigation data back home. I have NEVER trusted the App Store. It has been intentionally hard to use, using dark patterns, and tracking usage ever since iPhone OS 2. Unfortunately for the researchers, it has also been very clear about this; it’s essentially a website that can only be accessed with their custom client.
Up until recently, I’ve mostly trusted Apple because their business goals align with my personal goals; breaking that trust would only harm them without providing any benefit. Recently however, the services arm of the company has gone more aggressively into advertising; I don’t trust ANYTHING from Apple that’s linked to advertising, which now includes not only the App Store, iCloud, Books, News, Stocks, Fitness, Podcasts, Apple Music and Apple TV, but also Apple Maps.
That’s security through obscurity, as well as shared keys.
What happens when the burglar in waiting watches someone grab the key and use it?
Or in the case of phone security, what happens when your address is printed on the key?
A better analogy is fire lock boxes, where apartment complexes have a master key stored in a box out front that can be unlocked with a master key firemen carry.
Unfortunately, that bic pen trick turned out to work on those lock boxes a decade or so ago, meaning all a burglar needed to get into ANY residence in ANY building with a fire lock box was a bic pen. In fact, a burglar could open the box, get the key, duplicate it, put it back in the box, and nobody would even know security had been compromised.
It’s a pretty good analogy for what’s being asked for here.