Yet another Hacker News

22 points semidror 1 hour ago 10 comments

I disabled Siri in the Settings app, and then further disabled Siri and its extensions in Settings > Screen Time.

Next, I disabled all Siri-related and Apple Intelligence-related services as per https://github.com/OleksandrKrupko/mac-os-debloat

But after restarting, I could still see a "Siri" process running in Activity Monitor. Upon further inspection, I found that it is the "Siri AI.app".

These "features", together with Apple's Personal Context sound very similar to Microsoft's Recall.

Does anyone have the same experience? Is it really impossible to fully turn off Siri, Siri AI, Apple Intelligence and all related services and features on macOS 27?

dosisking 38 minutes ago | parent

Resistance is futile.

Nata_Elisym 37 minutes ago | parent

In Screen Time -> Content and Privacy, there's a setting to switch Siri to 'Siri Classic' which strips out the Apple Intelligence-backed behavior specifically.

semidror 2 minutes ago | parent

Instead of "Siri Classic", I selected the "Don’t Allow Siri" option, but it didn't help. The "Siri" (Siri AI.app) process keeps running regardless.

wpm 37 minutes ago | parent

Try disabling any of the launchd tasks related to it, odds are theres a service that starts at boot/login regardless of any user-facing setting that do nothing if they're all turned off (just like iCloud related daemons).

Odds are you'll probably run into something that requires you to disable SIP, like I did when I got tired of mediaanalysisd eating up CPU cycles on a 2018 Mac mini.

chuckadams 29 minutes ago | parent

I've been daily-driving a mac for 10 years now and I've only ever triggered Siri by accident. I do use it pretty regularly on the phone, mostly to set timers, get directions, and call contacts, but I've been well trained over these years to not expect it to be capable of more than that.

nottorp 26 minutes ago | parent

Just as a note, from what I see the problem is not only the privacy implications but also that the local AI comes with a baggage amounting to 10% of the space on the base mac models. Which is already severely limited.

threetonesun 3 minutes ago | parent

I have not found the local/remote hand off to be very reliable either, so tasks that used to be almost instantaneous for Siri are now spinning to the point where I assume they failed. A simple 2 minute timer took almost 30 seconds to set the other day.

VCFundedGenYer 9 minutes ago | parent

I've love to disable Apple Intelligence just to get the space back. It's murdering my Mac Mini.

danfritz 6 minutes ago | parent

I didn't check it yet but I hope being in EU macOS 27 upgrade is basically small UI tweaks and thats it :D

Still holding off for now

avazhi 5 minutes ago | parent

Sequoia will be taken from my cold dead hands.