It's completely reasonable to ask for evidence. Don't apologise for asking!
I'm not part of any state, and I don't have access to any special knowledge that you can't find on the internet.
I'm also not aware of any study that provides the very direct link you're asking for. Because of the nature of E2EE, I don't know if it would be possible to produce one. What I can do is link to evidence such as https://www.weprotect.org/global-threat-assessment-21/#repor..., which has (to me) some fairly compelling data showing that the magnitude of the problem is increasing.
I'm not part of any state, and I don't have access to any special knowledge that you can't find on the internet.
I'm also not aware of any study that provides the very direct link you're asking for. Because of the nature of E2EE, I don't know if it would be possible to produce one. What I can do is link to evidence such as https://www.weprotect.org/global-threat-assessment-21/#repor..., which has (to me) some fairly compelling data showing that the magnitude of the problem is increasing.