Ask HN: Is Apple really phoning home every time I start an application on macOS?
2 by mahathu | 4 comments on Hacker News.
I'm not sure if this sort of question is welcome here, but I'd imagine it could allow for some interesting discussion beyond the scope of the initial question. I'm living on an extremely restricted internet connection right now that completely drops out every few minutes (my ISP is Vodafone, fellow German users will know what I mean.) I noticed that when my internet connection stalls, but I'm still connected to the wifi, I'm unable to open certain apps. So far I've experienced it with VLC, VS Code and Firefox. I remember some time ago there were rumours that apple was actually sending usage statistics every time I launch an app back to their servers. If the connection is interrupted, the apps don't start. Is this actually the right explanation? If that is true, this would be so nightmarishly dystopian to me I'd consider switching back to linux. Thank you!