legit curious, if you read 'zero privileges' does it parse easier

It parses easier, but it's still doing extra work to negate the 'needs'.

doesn't need privileges > needs zero privileges > needs no privileges

"No" here doesn't negate needs. It is part of a subordinate clause "no privileges". Substitute with "nothing" (literally, no thing) for the same parse.

Agree.

    "Give me a 4 apples."
    "Give me a 999 apples."
    "Give me a 0 apples."

The last one doesn't say "do not give me apples" and it surely doesn't say "do not give me a zero apples".

FWIW this is exactly how you negate a verb in German. For example: "Ich rauche nicht " -> "I don't smoke" or "Ich brauche keinen Mantel" -> "I don't need a coat"

English |-n't| is also a negation that applies to what comes before. In fact I don't think you actually can put a verbal negation before the verb in English in ordinary/modern circumstances; only a few verbs can be directly negated, and if one of those isn't present, one is added (usually "do", this is called "do-support") ... and the negation goes after it.

"This is how you negate a verb" -> "This is not how you negate a verb" ('is' can be negated, the negation goes after)

"This confuses the duke" -> "This does not confuse the duke" ('confuses' wants do-support to negate it, and the negation goes after 'do'.)

You are right. However, I would argue that semantically the "do" is part of the negation.

Actually, you can do the same in German ("Ich tu nicht essen" -> "I do not eat"), but it's very colloquial and "forbidden" in writing. The proper form is "Ich esse nicht".

"doesn't need any privileges" is more tokens :^)

Recently Claude and GPT have either both acquired this tic or I've become hypersensitive to it but it's just unbearable and it turns out that an editing pass which forbids "X verbs no noun" constructions will basically always improve a piece of writing. If I could only pick one construct to ban I'd probably choose it even over the classic "not X but Y".