How to Turn off ‘Find My’ on a Mac
Find My is a feature that allows you to locate your Apple products, like your iPhone or your Mac, if they are lost or stolen. It’s tied to your Apple ID, which allows you to track any of your connected devices from any of your other devices, or via the iCloud website on virtually any device at all. If you’re worried about being tracked by Find My on your Mac, you can turn it off through System Preferences. This feature can be turned on and off at any time as long as you have access to your Mac, and switching it off doesn’t remove any of your data. Here’s how to turn off Find My on a Mac:
How Do You Turn off Find My Mac From Another Device?
You can’t turn off the Find My Mac feature from another device. What you can do, however, is erase the Mac from that other device.
Why Do I Need to Turn off Find My Mac for Repair?
Before you send a Mac in for repairs, you need to turn off Find My Mac. Apple doesn’t disclose exactly why this requirement exists, but the most likely reasons are they may need to offer you a replacement unit instead of repairing yours, it serves to prove you are the owner of the device, and they probably don’t want people to be able to track the location of their repair facilities for security purposes. When you send in an Apple product for repairs or warranty work, it isn’t always sent to an Apple repair facility. In the event repairs are too costly or complicated, they may offer to provide you with a replacement unit instead of fixing yours. Your device may be repaired later or simply disposed of, but in either case, there would be no reason for your Apple ID to still be associated with the device, or for Find My to still be enabled. By requiring you to disable Find My, Apple also effectively verifies you are the owner of the device. Since this feature can’t be disabled unless you know both the Apple ID password and local password associated with the device, the fact you can disable the feature proves you own it.
