MacBook Air stuck in Activation

Hi Jack,

If your MacBook Air boots to an Activate Mac screen, that needs to be taken care of first.

When the Activate Mac screen appears, connect to a Wi-Fi network: click the Wi-Fi icon in the top right corner, then ensure that you're connected to a nearby network. Once that's done, the screen should change, and you'll either be informed that activation was successful, or you'll be asked for credentials. In the second case, provide the requested credentials (either your login password or your Apple ID password) in order to complete activation.

Hi Jack,

If your Mac has the M1 chip, the most common reason for this happening is that a Lock or Erase command was issued via Find My, perhaps from one of your other devices (maybe while your friend had your iPhone). This is the only scenario that could explain an unexpected reboot into Recovery.

Commands issued via Find My become effective the next time the target device (your Mac) connects to the Internet. A remote lock command does this behind the scenes:

1. The Mac connects to the Internet, and checks in with Find My.
2. Find My relays a pending Lock command.
3. The M1 Mac erases certain device activation info, and then immediately restarts.
4. At boot time, the Mac can’t boot into macOS, because the activation data mentioned earlier is required in order for Secure Boot to succeed. Therefore, the Mac must boot into macOS Recovery.
5. macOS Recovery detects that the device activation data is missing, and restarts the activation process. When complete, your Mac can start up in regular macOS again.

If you believe that someone else has accessed your Apple ID, you should change your password immediately: https://iforgot.apple.com

satcomer,

The Mac activation process isn’t a Trojan. It’s designed to ensure that only the Mac’s rightful owner can use it (and not a thief).

Apple describes what happens during activation behind the scenes: LocalPolicy signing-key creation and management - Apple Support (CA)

"Hotspot" is a wireless connection option; you don't plug anything in.

What exactly are you attempting to do?

It's called someone either doesn't know that trojans now affect most cheap rpm expensive routers today! Sounds it tried to download a trojan to users!