Your Mac can feel like your digital home, a safe space for entertainment or work. However, spam notifications can quickly disrupt the calm of your Mac, disturbing you with all sorts of promotions and unnecessary information.
While some of the notifications may be genuine harmless promotions that have cumulated to be spam, some are actually malicious and may lead you to sites that can harm your computer.
Here, we've made a list of actions you can take to stop spam on your Mac once and for all.
1. Remove Rogue Calendars
The Calendar app is a valuable tool for tracking events, dates, and meetings. However, certain calendar subscriptions can hijack the app and plague you with endless notifications full of bogus claims. These rogue calendars are how the famous iPhone Calendar spam works.
You can remove rogue calendars on your Mac by simply following these simple steps:
- Launch Calendar from the Dock or press Command + Space to find it using Spotlight search.
- Look to the app's left pane and find the category called Other.
- Control-click (or right-click) any suspicious calendars and select unsubscribe.
Even though these notifications may appear like a virus, they aren't, and the only way to stop them is to remove the calendar. And while they may not affect your computer, following the links in the notification can take you to the real harmful sites.
2. Turn Off Browser Notifications
Websites can sometimes get permission to spam you with notifications. Suspicious websites could be tricky and prompt you to give them permission on your browser, and you may have done so without realizing it. However, some legit sites may also be spamming you with notifications you don't want to receive at the moment.
Either way, you've got to turn off browser notifications, and you can do that by disabling a specific website's permission or turning off global browser notifications.
Here's how to turn off a website's notification permission on Safari:
- Launch Safari by clicking the icon in the Dock.
- Click Safari in the menu bar to reveal the dropdown menu.
- Choose Settings, and it should open up a preferences window.
- Head to the Websites section and scroll down to Notifications in the sidebar menu.
- Select the website with spammy notifications and click Remove.
- You can also click Allow and change it to Deny to revoke its permissions.
Third-party browsers like Chrome, Firefox, and Edge also allow you to change these notifications in their settings.
If you would like to disable your browser notifications completely, do this instead:
- Launch System Settings and select Notifications from the left pane.
- It will open up a list of apps installed on your device (arranged alphabetically).
- Find your browser, select it, and toggle off Allow Notifications.
Doing this will stop all notifications from your browser—including important ones—so use it wisely.
3. Check for Malware or Trojan Horses
Malware is malicious software installed to cause harm. And trojan horses are malware that may disguise themselves as useful apps. You must be extra careful when installing apps from untrustworthy sources. Your spam notifications may be from malware you unintentionally installed on your computer.
If a suspicious program keeps sending you notifications in the Notification Center, it's easy to track where it's from.
Here's how to track it:
- Control-click (or right-click) the notification and select Notification Preferences.
- This will take you to its notification settings in the System Settings app, where you will see the name of the app sending the notifications.
- Now that you have the app's name, click Finder and choose Applications.
- Drag the suspicious program to the Trash icon on the Dock.
But there is still some very tricky malware out there that could even create custom untraceable notifications. Your best bet is to install antivirus software that scans your Mac and weeds out all suspects. We've compiled a list of the best free antivirus software for your Mac to make your search easier.
4. Change Your Notification Settings
When people think of notifications, the first thing they imagine is typically pop-in banners. But there are other ways to receive notifications. System Settings has a combination of settings you can choose for an app's notifications.
If the spam notifications appear on your screen and stay there as alerts, Control-click on an alert, select Notification Preferences and change the notification style from Alerts to Banners. If you don't want them at all, you can change it to None or toggle off Allow Notifications.
You can choose other things in the Notification Preferences menu, like whether you want the notification to play a sound or stay in the notification center. For more information, you should read more in our guide on controlling macOS notifications.
5. Unsubscribe From Junk Email Lists
If you're receiving excessive promotional or pointless emails that pop up as email notification spam, it's time to unsubscribe from them. Unsubscribing is better because muting your email app could work against you since you might miss important emails.
Here's how to unsubscribe from junk email lists:
- Launch your mail app or log in to your email in a browser.
- Select any email newsletter from your inbox.
- Scroll down to the very bottom of the message and click on the link that says "Unsubscribe."
- It will redirect you to a website where you must confirm your unsubscription.
In the future, be careful where you sign up online because many websites contain hidden confirmations to join mailing lists.
Say Bye to Spam Notifications on Your Mac
The tips here are bound to stop spam from plaguing you on your Mac again, leaving it to feel like the digital haven you know it as. However, it's still paramount that you remain careful of the websites you visit and the apps you use.
Many of them are designed to fool you into thinking they are harmless or trying to help you. Whatever the case, keep these tips in mind, and you should be able to get your notifications back under control.