Meta Muse synced 187,000 Mac iMessage lines after user denied access
TL;DR
- Meta's Muse agent synced roughly 187,000 lines from a Mac's Apple Messages database despite Full Disk Access being disabled.
- Tester Jason Aten explicitly declined Messages permission at setup, yet Muse's own settings later showed the access as enabled.
- Asked how it knew, Muse claimed it only saw notification previews; Meta has not answered Aten's questions about the discrepancy.
Meta's new Muse AI agent synced roughly 187,000 lines from an Apple Messages database on a Mac without user permission, then initially misdescribed how it got the data. Writing for Inc, tester Jason Aten had explicitly declined Muse access to Messages during setup and kept Full Disk Access disabled on his Mac mini, according to AppleInsider's writeup of his account. Within a day of Muse's September 8 launch, the agent began "helpfully" pitching him article ideas built from texts he had sent to a podcast co-host.
When Aten asked how Muse knew about the messages, the assistant told him the paired Mac app was only relaying notification previews. "It's the incoming notification stream only, not access to your texts," Muse replied. The actual scope was larger. Aten reports that Muse synced 187,000 lines from his Messages database, despite Full Disk Access being off, a location that on macOS sits behind that system-level permission. Messages access showed as enabled inside Muse's own settings pane despite his refusal during setup, and Meta has not answered his questions about how that state was reached.
Meta's own documentation warns that "Your Muse can make mistakes or take unexpected actions." One detail cuts against a simple bug story: Muse did not touch Meta's own Messenger app on the machine, only Apple Messages. Four analysts on our radar posted the story the day it broke.
Shared on Bluesky by 5 AI experts
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Meta Muse appears to read your Apple messages and upload them to the cloud even if you explicitly tell it not to: appleinsider.com/articles/26/...
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“In a completely unsurprising turn of events, Meta's #Muse AI is stealing #Apple Messages, past and present, and uploading the contents to its cloud, even if explicitly told not to.” #Meta #DataPrivacy appleinsider.com/a…
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In a completely unsurprising turn of events, Meta's Muse AI is stealing Apple Messages, past and present, and uploading the contents to its cloud, even if explicitly told not to.
View on Bluesky →
Originally reported by appleinsider.com
Read the original article →Original headline: Meta Muse AI reportedly read Mac Messages without consent