What are those security and privacy reasons? > A third-party can't compromise the hardware [..] a thief has no reason to steal a phone that they can't access,

What are those security and privacy reasons? > A third-party can't compromise the hardware [..] a thief has no reason to steal a phone that they can't access, can't re-sell This was already the case before component serialization. > can't strip for parts. Not true. Shops can still harvest most of the phone's parts and use them for replacements. Apple will likely never be able to prevent the replacement of analogue components (like the screen) completely. The only thing Apple achieved by doing this is making third-party repair more difficult and expensive, which I suspect is their intention with this stuff.