Syncdefaultsd Little Snitch

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Little Snitch is a host-based application firewall for macOS. It can be used to monitor applications, preventing or permitting them to connect to attached networks through advanced rules. It is produced and maintained by the Austrian firm Objective Development Software GmbH. GitHub Gist: instantly share code, notes, and snippets.

This is due to a limitation in Apple’s Network Extension API, which surprisingly whitelists a number of system services like Maps, FaceTime, App Store or Software Update and therefore doesn’t report the network activity of these services to third-party application firewalls.

Syncdefaultsd Little Snitch

The use of this new API is now mandatory for third-party developers on macOS Big Sur, because Apple no longer supports the previous kernel extension based approach, which didn’t suffer from this limitation.

Little snitch 10.14

We are currently investigating a solution in Little Snitch to make these whitelisted connections visible by means of alternative techniques.

There’s an ongoing discussion about this problem in various online media, and we assume that Apple will address these concerns in a future macOS update. See our blog article to learn more about this topic.

Syncdefaultsd Little Snitch Movie

At the time of this writing, the whitelist seems to inlcude the following macOS processes:

Little Snitch Os X

/System/Applications/App Store.app/Contents/MacOS/App Store
/System/Library/CoreServices/cloudpaird
/System/Library/CoreServices/mapspushd
/System/Library/CoreServices/Software Update.app/Contents/Resources/softwareupdated
/System/Library/Frameworks/Accounts.framework/Versions/A/Support/accountsd
/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreTelephony.framework/Support/CommCenter
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/ApplePushService.framework/apsd
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/AppStoreDaemon.framework/Support/appstoreagent
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/AppStoreDaemon.framework/Support/appstored
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/AssetCacheServices.framework/Versions/A/XPCServices/AssetCacheLocatorService.xpc/Contents/MacOS/AssetCacheLocatorService
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/AssistantServices.framework/Versions/A/Support/assistantd
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/AuthKit.framework/Versions/A/Support/akd
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/CloudKitDaemon.framework/Support/cloudd
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/CommerceKit.framework/Resources/commerced
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/CommerceKit.framework/Versions/A/Resources/commerce
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/CoreLSKD.framework/Versions/A/lskdd
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/CoreParsec.framework/parsecd
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/CoreSpeech.framework/corespeechd
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/DistributedEvaluation.framework/Versions/A/XPCServices/com.apple.siri-distributed-evaluation.xpc/Contents/MacOS/com.apple.siri-distributed-evaluation
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/FamilyCircle.framework/Versions/A/Resources/familycircled
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/FamilyNotification.framework/FamilyNotification
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/GeoServices.framework/Versions/A/XPCServices/com.apple.geod.xpc/Contents/MacOS/com.apple.geod
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/HomeKitDaemon.framework/Support/homed
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/IDS.framework/identityservicesd.app/Contents/MacOS/identityservicesd
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/IDSFoundation.framework/IDSRemoteURLConnectionAgent.app/Contents/MacOS/IDSRemoteURLConnectionAgent
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/IMCore.framework/imagent.app/Contents/MacOS/imagent
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/IMFoundation.framework/XPCServices/IMRemoteURLConnectionAgent.xpc/Contents/MacOS/IMRemoteURLConnectionAgent
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/IMTransferServices.framework/IMTransferAgent.app/Contents/MacOS/IMTransferAgent
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/MapsSuggestions.framework/MapsSuggestions
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/MapsSupport.framework/MapsSupport
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/MediaStream.framework/MediaStream
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/MusicLibrary.framework/MusicLibrary
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/PassKitCore.framework/passd
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/ProtectedCloudStorage.framework/Helpers/ProtectedCloudKeySyncing
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SyncedDefaults.framework/Support/syncdefaultsd
/System/Library/TextInput/kbd
/usr/libexec/coreduetd
/usr/libexec/diagnosticd
/usr/libexec/findmydeviced
/usr/libexec/fmfd
/usr/libexec/locationd
/usr/libexec/mdmclient
/usr/libexec/mobileactivationd
/usr/libexec/mobileassetd
/usr/libexec/networkserviceproxy
/usr/libexec/rtcreportingd
/usr/libexec/secd
/usr/libexec/siriknowledged
/usr/libexec/swcd
/usr/libexec/tailspind
/usr/libexec/teslad
/usr/libexec/timed
/usr/libexec/trustd
/usr/sbin/securityd
com.apple.facetime