Unapproved Caller

abstert wrote:

Sounds to me like my earlier comment was the right answer

By the way, abstert...

To me it sounds like your comment was a lead and incomplete answer. How the heck were peops supposed to delete that stuff with a Mac that doens't start? Okay, it was the right answer, but not a complete one.

Mind you, I'm very greatfull for your post, as I said!! Cause it led me instantly to the right thing to do to save my mac...

yay

that was a funny expression 🙂

Actually, you might forget that I have no clue what you were doing before the unapproved caller error showed up...

I would go for another round risk at least, from what I can assume you are talking about.

Please elaborate on your procedure if you don't take this as a good enough answer. My sanity's output is limited to the input... 😉

FYI if it helps anyone else. I started getting these "spool forever" results after two different Time Machine restores in two different situations. I didn't get the "Unapproved Caller" error until I tried one forum suggestion of resetting the NVRAM/PRAM. I also repaired permissions and removed the contents of /var/folders/ in single user mode. But it seemed odd and too concidental this should be a hardware issue in two cases using different hardware, and I've only been experiencing this recently in the last month or so.

What ended up being the issue, I suspect, was the Time Machine drives themselves. One was a test case in which I was backing up to it, but it was also originally a Deploy Studio formatted drive. The other was my server which I backup (THANKFULLY) to both a Time Capsule and SAS Raid Array. On the server restore, it was restoring from the third party managed/firmware-d RAID array that caused the faulty restore. But a second try using the Time Capsule instead solved the problem.

What I think happened is my Time Capsule is my only dedicated backup drive, utilized only by Apple devices and for no other purpose than Time Machine. The other drives that seemed to cause the bad restores were formatted initially by third party utilities, and in the case of the RAID array, also used ACL's that have been known to cause me problems in the past.

Obviously, my issue is not a cable, but could be related to other people having the same problem and wondering if a cable replacement is in order because empyting /var/folders/ didn't work. Well....not necessarily. Good luck on this one.

BRAVO !!!!

I was fiddling about in the System folder and suddenly I was stuck with the ominous "security Agent" message. I looked around to see if any agents were lurking about then after several failed"repair permissions" from recovery partition I came here.

I knew it wasn't catastrophic hardware failure since I could use a 2.5" laptop drive connected via a SATA to USB adapter (like $10 but worth $100)

It had a working install of 10.9.4 versus my "security agent" borked one.

I was about to CCC the System folder but this page popped up in Google. I will even add a helpful bit.

To get to that var folder, copy the command from earlier in thread. Hit "Go to folder" and here is where it gets tricky.....drag your bad HD to the window, it plops the path in there, no chance of using wrong backslash or spelling errors, etc. Then paste the command after. Went right to my "var" folder where there were 2 more weird folders. One was named "zzz" and the other had a different weird name. Inside "ZZZ" were a bunch of files with long hashtag looking stuff. On most the date and time were in distant past...but, there were a bunch within the last 4 hours while I have been fighting this alleged "agent".

Deleted and BINGO !!! Booted right up like nothing had ever been wrong.

To the people who think that it was a new HD or cable you needed....imagine you go to 2 different garages because your car shifts funny. One guy says you need a modulator valve for $100 and the other one says you need whole new transmission for $2,500. Who is right? Well, if it is the modulator valve, you'll get a new one in the $2,500 transmission. (along with $2,400 in parts you didn't need)

Of course replacing the HD would fix this. But removing the var folder is a lot easier and cheaper. (and you have nothing to lose)

Thank god for Google and forums !!!

how would u remove the files that create the unapproved calller dialogue without being able to fully boot up?

Hi! I'm having this same problem with my new rmbp 2014. Last night I tried to open google chrome, the dock icon jumped one time and then stopped jumping, the app never opened, I tried again a couple of times with the same result, went to force quit but there wasn't a instance of chrome running so I restarted and the problem was worse; everytime I opened a finder window, all the icons and file previews were gone (it only showed a dashed square) and the finder window and the window closes after a few seconds... restar again, and now "Unapproved Call

Repair permissions didn't worked, reseting power manager neither... sefe mode etc. Nothing worked so i'm now reinstaling Mavericks and see what happen. I hope I can get this fixed because my apple tech support store is 100 km away.

I had the 'Unapproved Caller' message appear on my new Mac mini. Didn't have a problem until after upgrading to 10.9.5. It didn't appear on startup... but my apps would go wonky and not work. Really weird behavior. When I choose Shut Down the message appears on a grey screen and the only way to shut down the system is to hold the start button until it turns off.

I started from Recovery and reinstalled OS X. It installed 10.9.4. Haven't had any problems since, but it's only been 1 day since reinstalling.

Decided to do some research and found this thread. Great thread!

Also found a post from James Reynolds who has this problem on 200 Macs after upgrading to 10.9 (at a university). He was curious about what the purpose of /var/folders is, so he wrote up some notes of his findings. Recommended reading:

http://blog.magnusviri.com/what-is-var-folders.html

I ran into this as well when updating one of our iMacs. I resolved it by booting into safe mode, running Mavericks Cache Cleaner (http://www.northernsoftworks.com/maverickscachecleaner.html) in deep clean mode and rebooting.

Worked perfectly.

Hope this helps someone.

Abstert, How can you delete the files if the unapproval caller bar comes our every time I try to erase it?

“Unapproved Caller SecurityAgent may only be invoked by Apple Software”

I have this problem since two months (MBP, late 2008). I have tried every possible solution suggested here and on other sites. None has helped so far. Here is the list of what I have tried so far:

1) Disk repair/Repair permission

• From recovery partition
• From a bootable USB drive

2) Single user mode experience:

• /sbin/fsck –fy
• /sbin/mount -uw /
• rm -Rf /var/folders/*

2) Resetting PRAM/NVRAM, SMC

3) Safe boot4) Changing hard drive with a new one

5) Changing RAM with new one

6) Changing hard drive cable with new onew (from ifixit)

7) Apple Hardware Tests (basic and advanced test showed no problem)

8) The problem persisted on all of the following OS X versions:

• OS X Mountain Lion (clean install)
• OS X Mavericks (clean install)
• OS X Yosemite (clean install)

I was waiting for Yosemite and hopping that it will end my suffering. No, it did not. The issue remained the same with OS X Yosemite as well.

Practically, I cannot do anything with my MBP because of freezing, apps crashing, stack at startup, nonresponding loginwindow, safari problems, app store problems, downloading problems, unexpected error messages, invalid certificate on every website (even on apple store) etc. It usually works for 5-10 minutes after login and then the only option is a “hard shutdown”.

The only solution that has worked for me so far is to switch to a windows-based PC! However, I do not know how to use windows since I am a Mac user from the beginning of time!

I am stuck on this problem; any help will be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!

Update:

I took my MBP to the local Apple authorized service provider. After one week of extensive testing:

1) No hardware issue

2) No software issue

3) We do not know what is the problem with your MBP.

iFrustration!

Solved!

After initial fail I had replaced my hard drive with a new one. The replaced hard drive was a hybrid drive (Seagate Laptop Thin SSHD 500GB Hard Drive ST500LM000 6Gb/s 64 MB Cache). However this maneuver did not solve my problem. As I mentioned in my previous post, after one week of testing even Apple authorized repair service could not be able to find any hardware or software issue with my MBP. As a last resort, I have decided to change my hard drive once again. This time I got a regular hard drive (Seagate Laptop Thin HDD 500GB 7200RPM Sata 2.0 32Mb 2.5" ). After two months of frustration now my MBP works flawlessly.

My conclusion:

Hybrid hard drives are not compatible with older MBPs (MBP, Late 2008).

Any other comments?

Thank you all.

Deep Breath.... Ok, so it took some doing but followed your guidance olli.vdl and it worked. Hooked my iMac to our MacMini. (I had issues with calling the proper folder on the proper hard drive... but finally found the path and deleted the files you listed.) After 4 hours of sweating and stressing, thankfully its solved.

Now the question remains, what sequence of events caused this in the first place. Obviously, don't want to have to repeat the process!

Thanks again for sharing the fix and your expertise!

Well, it has now been 2 months since my Unaprroved Caller problem. I upgraded my Mac mini from 10.9.4 directly to Yosemite and am now on 10.10.1. Yesterday Safari quit unexpectedly, leaving an Unapproved Caller message on my screen. Since that happened I have been experiencing this weirdness:

o Apps won't start when clicked in the Dock

o Apps start after flashing a black screen

o Apps unexpectedly quit

o I use a password-protected screen saver and when I return to my Mac and type in my password instead of opening to the Desktop it opens to the Login screen

o All the items on my desktop seemed frozen... I could not move them

o much more that I can't remember

Usually I just reboot and try to continue. This is so frustrating. I wish Apple would read these forums and at least leave a note that they have read the issue.

So some people replaced the cable that connects the drive to the motherboard inside their laptops. I am using a Mac mini and I don't even use the internal drive. Instead, I boot from a 1TB SSD inside an external drive enclosure that is connected via a Thunderbolt cable.

And some people have tried deleting the cache files inside the /var/folders/ directory. Seems to be mixed results.

What I'm wondering is this... has anyone tried reinstalling OS X on a freshly formatted hard drive (without installing any apps or data) to see if the errors still occur? If there are no errors then it would seem the next step is NOT to run Migration Assistant or copy everything back onto the new drive. Instead, reinstall the apps (re-download and re-install), and then only copy over the home directory.

I haven't tried this, but if this Unapproved Caller thing continues to be a problem then that is what I'm tempted to try.

And yes, I would love to know what causes this to happen in the first place. Let's keep this thread going.