Why block outgoing connections on Mac

People may wish to block outgoing connections for a variety of reasons, with the main one being privacy most of the times. If you’re reading this post, chances are you already tried to block outgoing connections on Mac. Efamilycloud app for mac. While OS X doesn’t have a feature that allows you to do so, blocking outgoing connections in OS X is easier than you may think.

Built-in incoming connections blocking

LuLu is a great free, shared-source, macOS firewall that can block unknown outgoing connections, unless explicitly approved by the user. It runs on OSX 10.12+ and runs well on macOS Mojave. It can be configured to allow or block Apple signed binaries and has clear GUI based rule set that can be edited. Although Mac OS X contains a built-in firewall, this firewall doesn’t actually block outgoing connections. Radio Silence blocks outgoing connections only, so the two firewalls complement each.

In order to block outgoing connections using a Terminal, you need to know the specific IP address associated to the service you want to block communication with. There are several ways to find your target IP address. So above are the two apps that will be helpful to Prevent Apps from Accessing Internet on Mac.Use these tools and you can easily manage all the internet access to the different apps on your Mac and that will help you to save a large amount of internet data and your bandwidth.

While you can prevent some applications, programs or services to accept incoming connections by configuring OS X built-in Firewall (Apple Menu => System Preferences => Firewall tab =>Firewall Options => Choose “Block incoming connections”, see the Figure below), to configure outgoing traffic preferences and block outgoing connections on Mac you need to download a third-party application.

How incoming connections preferences can be edited in OS X

How to block outgoing connections on Mac

Edit: when this tutorial was originally written, TCPBlock was still being updated. After OS X 10.11 (El Capitan), TCPBlock doesn’t work correctly on Mac anymore. If you are running OS X El Capitan or a more recent version of OS X like Sierra, then make sure you check out this updated tutorial. Users running OS X 10.09 (Yosemite) may also encounter some problems (even though it’s rare): in that case we recommend that you read the updated guide.

TCPBlock is a lightweight application that allows you to do exactly that, and you can download it from this link. Once you have gone through the download process, you just need to install it. In order to do this, open the package and follow the instructions. Then make sure you restart the machine you’re working with. You’re now ready to block you’re undesired outgoing connections.

Block App Outgoing Connection Mac Terminal Client

Using TCPBlock is very easy, just follow these steps:

1. First of all open the Apple Menu (Apple symbol on the upper left) and select System Preferences.
2. Now click on the fresh new TCPBlock icon (it should be at the bottom of the window).
3. If you see a closed lock at the bottom, just click on it and authenticate by prompting your password. If not, just skip this step.
4. Finally, after you made sure you have the boxes checked as below, you just need to click on the + button, click on Select Application and add the application you wish to block the outgoing connections of.
5. If you are having trouble finding an application, remember that you should find it under the “Application” tab you see on the left pane.

That’s it! You can now control all of the outgoing connections on your Mac. In addition you can even block all of the outgoing connections by checking the “Block all outgoing” box on the left if you wish to, just remember that this way you won’t be able to complete the majority of the tasks that require a connection to the internet.

Edit: unfortunately TCPBlock was discontinued. You can still download it, but it is now outdated. If you want to check out the updated tutorials we have on this topic, feel free to follow this link for a 2020 update, or this link for a tutorial focused on Little Snitch.

Block App Outgoing Connection Mac Terminal Adapter

For any doubt you may have, don’t hesitate to ask in the comments section below. If you found this tutorial helpful, please share 🙂 .