Mail App Contacts iCloud Even When You Send a Non-iCloud Email
Why does Mail app contact iCloud when sending a non-iCloud email?
A developer discovers that Apple's Mail app triggers iCloud connections via cloudd and nsurlsessiond every time an email is sent, even when iCloud Mail is disabled and the account is non-iCloud. The connections target gateway.icloud.com, but certificate pinning prevents inspection, leaving the purpose unknown. The author plans to block these connections with Little Snitch rules.
Why does Apple need to know when I’m sending emails?
- transcriptase
Fun activity: install glasswire on windows for a day or 2, set it to prompt you before any connection is allowed, and watch as about 500 different windows components attempt connections with Microsoft as a result of any and every action. And how many onedrive exes randomly fire off throughout the day despite having never once used it. And how onedrive changes its version number every day when it realizes it can’t connect.
- speak_plainly
Probably Handoff and cross-device application state syncing.
- kridsdale1
One Apple Mail feature nobody here has commented on was called Piano Mover internally. I don’t know the public marketing name. It lets attachments over 10MB in emails be replaced with iCloud hosted file references.
- bantunes
I assume for the same reason the OS pings Cupertino when you run a binary - surveillance, masquerading as protection.
- pseudalopex
A dead comment said It's previous recipients synced over iCloud. And said how to see this.[1] Vouch it if you can.