macOS security feature turned off by default on Touch Bar equipped MacBook Pro
Developers have discovered that a Mac security feature, present since OS X El Capitan, appears to be disabled on numerous Touch Bar equipped MacBook Pros. System Integrity Protection (SIP), is designed to help prevent potentially malicious software from modifying protected files and folders on your Mac. The feature also restricts the root user account and limits the actions that the root user can perform on protected parts of the Mac operating system. Generally, Apple has this turned on by default so it’s important to know if it’s enabled.
It should be mentioned that this flaw is present on both 13 and 15-inch Touch Bar models. To identify if SIP is enabled you can run the following command in the Terminal:
- Launch Terminal on your Mac
- Type in “csrutil status”
From there you will get one of two messages saying it’s either enabled or disabled. Should you find that the result turns back the disabled result you can turn it back on, although it does requires booting your Mac into Recovery mode and using the Terminal. Before tinkering around with any settings it’s recommended you have a recent back-up just in case.
- Boot to Recovery OS by restarting your machine and holding down the Command and R keys at startup
- From the Utilities menu launch Terminal
- Enter in “csrutil enable”
After enabling System Integrity Protection on a machine a reboot will be required. From here you can run the same Terminal command as before to check whether your actions were successful.
Apple is aware of the issue and we’re expecting to see a solution sometime soon.
*While these are steps written by Apple, The Apple Post does not take responsibility for any damage to hardware or loss of user data.