Square, white box appearing on a MacBook Air

Hi,

Recently whilst using my MacBook Air, on occasion a square white box has appeared, typically in the middle of my background. It typically appears whilst I am using safari, although I don’t know if this is related as this is a new occurrence. This box is opaque, I cannot interact with it whatsoever by moving it, and it does not go away unless I shut my computer down. I’ve run First Aid, changed my screensaver to see if it was that, and I’ve tried using Diagnostics when starting it up to see if it is a hardware issue, and nothing appears to be there? I’ve spoken to an Apple representative online and they didn’t appear to know what was causing it? (And I don’t know if this is related but my Mac also won‘t update to the new iOS Sierra)

Am I missing something obvious? Anyone know what might be causing it and what to do? Any help is appreciated.

MacBook Air

Posted on Jul 12, 2018 3:22 PM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jul 12, 2018 3:52 PM

My best guess at this point is that this "square white box" may be a dialog box for some application or process that was not fully removed from your Mac. It may be possible, that it could be an extension or plug-in for Safari, since you mention that is typically when you see it.


It may also be possible that your Mac is "infected" with some form of malware or adware that is causing this.


To help troubleshoot your Mac, I would suggest that you consider using EtreCheck and posting the resultant report for us to review. (Note: The EtreCheck report does NOT contain any personal information.)


  • You can download EtreCheck fromhere.
  • Start EtreCheck from a normal user account. Optionally, you can run it from a user account with Administrator privileges.
  • Select a problem from the drop-down menu to enable the "Start EtreCheck" button. Optionally, you can add comments on what issues your Mac is experiencing, especially to aide others with similar Mac issues.
  • Click on Start EtreCheck
  • Allow the program to run to completion.
  • When done, select Report from the left-side window to display it.
  • Select the "Share Report" icon.

    Select Copy Report

  • Paste the report to your reply post.
5 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jul 12, 2018 3:52 PM in response to hlosdo02

My best guess at this point is that this "square white box" may be a dialog box for some application or process that was not fully removed from your Mac. It may be possible, that it could be an extension or plug-in for Safari, since you mention that is typically when you see it.


It may also be possible that your Mac is "infected" with some form of malware or adware that is causing this.


To help troubleshoot your Mac, I would suggest that you consider using EtreCheck and posting the resultant report for us to review. (Note: The EtreCheck report does NOT contain any personal information.)


  • You can download EtreCheck fromhere.
  • Start EtreCheck from a normal user account. Optionally, you can run it from a user account with Administrator privileges.
  • Select a problem from the drop-down menu to enable the "Start EtreCheck" button. Optionally, you can add comments on what issues your Mac is experiencing, especially to aide others with similar Mac issues.
  • Click on Start EtreCheck
  • Allow the program to run to completion.
  • When done, select Report from the left-side window to display it.
  • Select the "Share Report" icon.

    Select Copy Report

  • Paste the report to your reply post.

Jul 13, 2018 7:50 AM in response to hlosdo02

I know this will sound counterintuitive, but I would recommend that you fully uninstall Sophos from your Mac. Macs do not get viruses and these apps cause more issues than they solve. Notice how much CPU process is being used for background scanning?


Also your Mac is running numerous versions of the Flash Player. I suggest you remove them as well and only add back any you really need.


Temporarily or permanently remove any extensions or plugins you are using in your web browser.


Finally, run the Apple Diagnostics to be sure there are no hardware issues with your Mac.

Jul 12, 2018 4:35 PM in response to Tesserax

Having had a look at it, I am inclined to believe it might be something to do with Microsoft and not having fully removed it, although I could be wrong (I do need to get around to setting up Time Machine)

Any guidance appreciated!


Here is the text version below:



Major Issues:

Anything that appears on this list needs immediate attention.

No Time Machine backup - Time Machine backup not found.


Minor Issues:

These issues do not need immediate attention but they may indicate future problems.

Apps with heavy CPU usage - There have been numerous cases of apps with heavy CPU usage.

Unsigned files - There are unsigned software file installed. They appear to be legitimate but should be reviewed.

Low performance - EtreCheck report took over 5 minutes to run. This is unusual.

32-bit Apps - This machine has 32-bits apps that may have problems in the future.


Hardware Information:

MacBook Air (13-inch, 2017)

MacBook Air Model: MacBookAir7,2

1 1.8 GHz Intel Core i5 (i5-5350U) CPU: 2-core

8 RAM - Not upgradeable

BANK 0/DIMM0 - 4 GB DDR3 1600 ok

BANK 1/DIMM0 - 4 GB DDR3 1600 ok

Battery: Health = Normal - Cycle count = 47


Video Information:

Intel HD Graphics 6000 - VRAM: 1536 MB

Color LCD 1440 x 900


Drives:

disk0 - APPLE SSD SM0512G 500.28 GB (Solid State - TRIM: Yes)

Internal PCI 5.0 GT/s x4 Serial ATA

disk0s1 - EFI (MS-DOS FAT32) [EFI] 210 MB

disk0s2 500.07 GB

disk1s1 - Macintosh HD (APFS) 500.07 GB (51.93 GB used)

disk1s2 - Preboot (APFS) [APFS Preboot] 500.07 GB (21 MB used)

disk1s3 - Recovery (APFS) [Recovery] 500.07 GB (519 MB used)

disk1s4 - VM (APFS) [APFS VM] 500.07 GB (2.15 GB used)


Mounted Volumes:

disk1s1 - Macintosh HD 500.07 GB (445.30 GB free)

APFS

Mount point: /


disk1s4 - VM [APFS VM] 500.07 GB (445.30 GB free)

APFS

Mount point: /private/var/vm


Network:

Interface en4: iPad

Interface en3: iPhone

Interface en0: Wi-Fi

802.11 a/b/g/n/ac

One IPv4 address

4 IPv6 addresses

Interface en2: Bluetooth PAN

Interface bridge0: Thunderbolt Bridge

iCloud Quota: 30.42 GB available


System Software:

macOS High Sierra 10.13.4 (17E199)

Time since boot: Less than an hour

System Load: 2.71 (1 min ago) 2.98 (5 min ago) 3.51 (15 min ago)


Security:

System Status

Gatekeeper Mac App Store and identified developers

System Integrity Protection Enabled


Unsigned Files:

Launchd: /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.microsoft.OneDriveUpdaterDaemon.plist

Executable: /Applications/OneDrive.app/Contents/OneDriveUpdaterDaemon.xpc/Contents/MacOS/On eDriveUpdaterDaemon

Details: Exact match found in the whitelist - probably OK



32-bit Applications:

One 32-bit app


Kernel Extensions:

/Library/Extensions

[Loaded] SophosFileProtection.kext (9.6.53 - SDK 10.11)

[Loaded] SophosWebProtection.kext (9.6.52 - SDK 10.11)


System Launch Agents:

[Not Loaded] 8 Apple tasks

[Loaded] 175 Apple tasks

[Running] 110 Apple tasks

[Other] One Apple task


System Launch Daemons:

[Not Loaded] 37 Apple tasks

[Loaded] 182 Apple tasks

[Running] 115 Apple tasks


Launch Agents:

[Loaded] com.microsoft.update.agent.plist (Microsoft Corporation - installed 2018-05-23)

[Running] com.sophos.uiserver.plist (Sophos - installed 2018-05-23)

[Running] com.sophos.agent.plist (Sophos - installed 2018-05-23)


Launch Daemons:

[Loaded] com.microsoft.OneDriveUpdaterDaemon.plist (? 0 - installed 2018-05-23)

[Loaded] com.microsoft.autoupdate.helper.plist (Microsoft Corporation - installed 2018-05-23)

[Loaded] com.apple.installer.osmessagetracing.plist (Apple - installed 2018-06-20)

[Loaded] com.adobe.fpsaud.plist (Adobe Systems, Inc. - installed 2018-06-25)

[Loaded] com.microsoft.office.licensingV2.helper.plist (Microsoft Corporation - installed 2018-05-14)

[Running] com.sophos.common.servicemanager.plist (Sophos - installed 2018-05-23)


User Launch Agents:

[Running] com.spotify.webhelper.plist (Spotify - installed 2018-07-12)

[Loaded] com.dropbox.DropboxMacUpdate.agent.plist (Dropbox, Inc. - installed 2018-05-23)


User Login Items:

iTunesHelper Application (Apple - installed 2018-07-10)

(/Applications/iTunes.app/Contents/MacOS/iTunesHelper.app)

Dropbox Application (Dropbox, Inc. - installed 2018-07-11)

(/Applications/Dropbox.app)

StartUpHelper SMLoginItem (Spotify - installed 2018-07-03)

(/Applications/Spotify.app/Contents/Library/LoginItems/StartUpHelper.app)


Internet Plug-ins:

FlashPlayer-10.6: 30.0.0.134 (installed 2018-07-10)

QuickTime Plugin: 7.7.3 (installed 2018-03-28)

Flash Player: 30.0.0.134 (installed 2018-07-10)

PepperFlashPlayer: 30.0.0.134 (installed 2018-07-10)


3rd Party Preference Panes:

Flash Player (installed 2018-06-25)


Time Machine:

Time Machine Not Configured!


Top Processes by CPU:

Process (count) Source % of CPU Location

SophosScanD ? 55

kernel_task Apple 15

WindowServer Apple 14

com.apple.WebKit.WebContent (13) Apple 8

SophosScanAgent Sophos 6


Top Processes by Memory:

Process (count) Source RAM usage Location

com.apple.WebKit.WebContent (15) Apple 1.98 GB

kernel_task Apple 764 MB

SophosScanD ? 314 MB

Dropbox (3) Dropbox, Inc. 186 MB

MTLCompilerService (11) Apple 178 MB


Top Processes by Network Use:

Process Source Input Output Location

softwareupdated Apple 193 MB 1 KB

nsurlsessiond Apple 1 MB 1 KB

com.apple.WebKit.Networking Apple 745 KB 29 KB

SophosWebIntelligence ? 217 KB 142 KB

Dropbox Dropbox, Inc. 68 KB 152 KB


Top Processes by Energy Use:

Process (count) Source Energy (0-100) Location

SophosScanD ? 21

WindowServer Apple 4

SophosScanAgent Sophos 4

Safari Apple 3

hidd Apple 1


Virtual Memory Information:

Available RAM 3.13 GB

Free RAM 72 MB

Used RAM 4.87 GB

Cached files 3.06 GB

Swap Used 72 MB


Software Installs (past 30 days):

Name Version Install Date

MRTConfigData 1.35 2018-06-19

Adobe Pepper Flash Player 30.0.0.134 2018-07-10

Adobe Flash Player 30.0.0.134 2018-07-10

Pages 7.0 2018-07-10

Numbers 5.0 2018-07-10

Keynote 8.0 2018-07-10

Gatekeeper Configuration Data 147 2018-07-11


Diagnostics Information (past 7 days):

2018-07-11 15:15:25 SophosScanD.app CPU

/Library/Sophos Anti-Virus/SophosScanD.app



End of report

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Square, white box appearing on a MacBook Air

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