Yeah, I just checked my account and the phones that I didn't sell or send back to Apple are all still in my account, despite all being on the same backup chain.

Yeah, I just checked my account and the phones that I didn't sell or send back to Apple are all still in my account, despite all being on the same backup chain. I suspect that the user above fell victim to something similar to what was mentioned in the article and had the device removed from their account that way.