Some users have noticed settings that let Meta analyze and retain phone photos

IMO Apple should provide the user with audit logs of which photos/videos were accessed by each app. It might be a long list but it alleviates doubt and would put huge pressure on reputable developers to ensure they don’t get caught doing things the user wouldn’t have expected (even if the user technically allowed it).

I don’t understand why apps need access to my photos at all. (with some very specific exceptions,) apps should only access a photo, which I first select using the system photo picker. There’s no need for apps to access the entire camera roll just so I can select one photo to use with that app.

I know that that’s partially implemented with the limited photo access now, but it’s confusing from a UI perspective and I don’t understand why this isn’t the default.

The only apps that need full access to my camera roll, are apps like Google Photos, Nextcloud or Immich. Everyone else can suck a lemon.

iOS already has exactly the experience you describe and it clearly urges you toward sharing only specific photos.

The only feature request I have is to be able to scope app permissions to an album, since the current flow of selecting individual photos adds a lot of friction.

Well, no. It keeps giving permission to the app, and it’s a lot of clicks to manage.

It shouldn’t give access at all, but use a secure clipboard implementation so that only that app can read it out exactly once.