---
title: "Properly Generate a Randomized MAC Address on macOS"
date: 2023-08-16
tags: ['macOS', 'Privacy']
author: Tommy
---

Unlike iOS, macOS does not have an easy way to randomize the MAC address. To work around this, various guides recommended several ways to create a randomized MAC address and apply it to the system during runtime. Unfortunately, most of the instructions do not have a proper threat model in mind and will end up making you stick out more from the crowd.

![Standing Out](/images/standing-out.png)

### The Threat Model

Consider the following:
- macOS does not support MAC address randomization by default
- Most if not all macOS computers around you will use their real MAC address with Apple's OUI (the first 3 octets of your MAC address)
- You cannot hide that you are using a mac (because of your hostname, connections to Apple's servers, etc)

Randomizing the mac address only makes sense if you use a not-very-unique hostname (like Macbook-Pro),