A Tool to Kill Visual Image Lookup on macOS (github.com)

A small open-source utility called maKiller (egorFiNE/maKiller on GitHub) watches for and kills macOS’s mediaanalysisd in real time. mediaanalysisd performs local OCR and image recognition on files and can trigger internet lookups for things it finds; disabling it normally requires turning off System Integrity Protection (SIP), which weakens system security. maKiller provides a targeted alternative by monitoring the process list and terminating mediaanalysisd as soon as it launches, aiming to reduce automatic image scanning and external lookups without disabling SIP. Technically, maKiller is a CMake-built binary that you install to /usr/local/bin and register as a system LaunchDaemon (the repo includes a com.egorfine.makiller.plist) so it runs with the privileges needed to watch/kill the system process and persist across reboots. Installation requires sudo and uses launchctl to load the daemon. Trade-offs: stopping mediaanalysisd can break features that rely on on-device image analysis (Photos, Spotlight results, Visual Look Up), and running a third-party privileged daemon to kill a system process introduces its own security/maintenance considerations. This tool is mainly relevant to privacy-conscious users who prefer a surgical approach to disabling automatic image analysis without turning off SIP.