Discontinue iCloud

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Level 1

23 points

Discontinue iCloud

Guys & Girls,

It appears to me that the "iCloud" is a very dubious entity. No one knows where or what it is but it houses much of our private information. I have many files that I do not want in the cloud to be hacked by some ambitious programmer. I did not ask for, nor do I want to continue its use. I can go to System Preferences > Apple ID > iCloud > iCloud Drive and uncheck it. But then it gives me a dialog box that states "If you turn off iCloud Drive, all documents stored in iCloud will be removed from this Mac. This includes documents on your Desktop and in your Documents folder which will be available on iCloud Drive only." I'm given an option to "Keep a Copy" but what does that mean? Where does the copy go. I don't want anything in the "Cloud". Please tell me how do I proceed to effectively stop its use and more importantly wipe iCloud clean without losing any files on my Mac?

Thanks, Phil

Macintosh b'Gosh

iMac 27″, macOS 11.2

Posted on Mar 21, 2021 12:33 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

FoxFifth

Level 10

469,179 points

Mar 21, 2021 1:09 PM in response to philhansen

The copy is saved to the iCloud Drive (Archive) folder in your Home folder. See the following from Add your Desktop and Documents files to iCloud Drive - Apple Support

If you turn off iCloud Drive or sign out of iCloud, you have the option to keep a local copy of your files that are in iCloud Drive. Whether you decide to keep a local copy or not, a new Desktop and Documents folder is created in your home folder. If you choose to keep a local copy, your files in iCloud Drive are copied to a folder called iCloud Drive (Archive) in your home folder. Then you have the option to move any files that were in your iCloud Desktop and Documents, back to your new local Desktop and Documents.

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Answer 2

philhansen Author

Level 1

23 points

Mar 23, 2021 7:48 AM in response to philhansen

I think I have a solution that will accomplish what I want and save the benefit of iCloud storage. I have added a folder that I call "Private" to my home folder and moved all those sensitive files to it. When I moved those files it warned me that I was removing them from the cloud. I wonder if I really did, however. I'll just have to take cloud's word for it.

What do you think?

Phil

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Answer 3

FoxFifth

Level 10

469,179 points

Mar 23, 2021 8:32 AM in response to philhansen

Yes, if you move files out of iCloud Drive (including out of Desktop and Documents if you have that option turned on), then those files are removed from iCloud and will not sync to it. Sorry, I would have suggested that if I had understood that you wanted to continue to use iCloud for some files.

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