Disabling Siri completely

[spock999]

Hi,

I may be in a minority but I find Siri very intrusive and have always disabled it. I am operating on 10.14.6.

Recently I received a very dubious email which seemed to be mirroring a friends email address. It arrived in Junk (using Mail). I opened it but decided that it was too risky to click on the enclosed link and deleted it via Erase Junk mail.

OK, that got rid of it but a week or so later when I start to compose an email to that friend, the dubious email address was offered up as an option courtesy of Siri.

This is something that should never happen but especially so when I have supposedly disabled siri in Settings.

Is it possible to completely disable Siri so it doesn't do anything even in the background?

Thanks

 

[ferrarr]

Do you have any other iDevices, besides the Mac you referenced?

See if this Apple Support article helps, Delete email addresses in Mail on Mac - Apple Support

 

[IWT]

Bob hit the nail on the head.

His link is excellent. The problem is that Mail keeps a note of every person or site that has sent you an email.

This is nearly always helpful when you want to send an email to someone who has previously sent you one; but don't have a record of their first email or you deleted it.

Consequently, using the method described (Mail > Window > Previous Recipients) is the way to see everyone who has sent you an email and delete those you don't want. BTW, this is useful, too, if Joe Boggs has changed his email address because his old one comes up as well as the new one. You can delete the old.

Your problem is not really Siri-related. It is Previous Recipients. I doubt Siri had anything to do with it.

Ian

 

[toMACsh]

the link won't open for me in Edge, here at work

 

[IWT]

the link won't open for me in Edge, here at work

Basically, this is what it says:

"Mail keeps a list of your previous recipients and uses it to suggest or complete addresses for you when you send email. You can delete obsolete or incorrect addresses from the list in Mail.
In the Mail app on your Mac, choose Window > Previous Recipients.

Find the address you want to delete. You can search for it or sort the list by clicking a column header.

If you want to check the address in the Contacts app, double-click the card icon in front of the address. If you don’t see a card and want to keep the address in Contacts, just select the address, then click Add to Contacts.
Click Remove From List."

All of which sort of correlates with my comments in post #3.

Ian

 

[spock999]

Sorry but it is most definitely Siri related.

I have looked in the suggested Windows>Previous Recipients and the address is not there.

Before I posted this thread, I had looked for the email address in question. I found it by looking in the Contact details for my friend under Other and it gave the address followed by "suggested by Siri". I right clicked on it and was given the option to ignore which I duly did and it disappeared. Maybe Siri originally found it under previous recipients but lodging the address in my Contacts when Siri isn't enabled is totally beyond the pale!

 

[toMACsh]

Basically, this is what it says:
...

Thanks. I haven't had a chance to try it on my Mac. Great tip! I knew how to do it in Windows, but not in Mail. (still can't "rep" you)

 

[Lifeisabeach]

Sorry but it is most definitely Siri related.

I have looked in the suggested Windows>Previous Recipients and the address is not there.

Before I posted this thread, I had looked for the email address in question. I found it by looking in the Contact details for my friend under Other and it gave the address followed by "suggested by Siri". I right clicked on it and was given the option to ignore which I duly did and it disappeared. Maybe Siri originally found it under previous recipients but lodging the address in my Contacts when Siri isn't enabled is totally beyond the pale!

Apple calls it “Siri Suggestions”, but it has nothing to do with the voice assistant. It’s really a function of Spotlight. I’m not in front of my Mac, but if you look at the Spotlight preference pane, I think you can turn off using Spotlight with email there.

Edit: so as it turns out, Siri Suggestions and Spotlight Suggestions are 2 different things, though what and why eludes me.

 

[chscag]

I’m not in front of my Mac, but if you look at the Spotlight preference pane, I think you can turn off using Spotlight with email there.

You would have to turn off all Siri suggestions from the Spotlight preference pane as there is no single option to turn off Siri suggestions for email.

 

[IWT]

You would have to turn off all Siri suggestions from the Spotlight preference pane as there is no single option to turn off Siri suggestions for email.

I actually agree with you, Charlie, but what if you unselect Mail & Messages? What does that do?



Ian

 

[chscag]

I actually agree with you, Charlie, but what if you unselect Mail & Messages? What does that do?

I'm not sure if that would turn off the email suggestions as "Life" indicated or if that would just eliminate "Mail & Messages" from a Spotlight search. I suppose the OP could try it to see if that would quiet Siri.

 

[spock999]

This is helpful but not quite as shown above. It stimulated me to search on both Siri and Spotlight suggestions.

According to Apple turning off Spotlight suggestions limits Spotlight to your device and no longer looks on the web. I have therefore left it enabled. As mentioned above, it looks like the Mail & Message section allows Spotlight to search mail so I have left that enabled.

Looking at the Siri settings pane, in the bottom RH corner there is a button entitled Siri Suggestions & Privacy which shows the apps in which Siri suggestions are active including Mail. I have turned them all off.

In the iCloud settings section, there is a box allowing Siri to operate through iCloud which I have cleared.

Hopefully that will limit Siri activities but I have to say it is much more difficult to do so than it should be!!! I will now repeat all of this on the other Mac and my phone

Thanks for the advice.

 

[Rod]

I really am struggling to understand why one could, "find Siri very intrusive and have always disabled it."
Personally I don't use Siri for voice actuated commands, I removed the shortcut from my Dock and hid it on my Menu Bar (via Bartender) but it can be removed by unticking the "Show Siri In Menu Bar" option in preferences.
Apart from that I cannot see how it effects any function of the system if you don't use it.
"Suggestions" in Spotlight can be turned off in preferences but as already stated that is not really anything to do with Siri Voice Assistant.
What I would like is a way of deleting email addresses of previous recipients. I notice that Mail now offers the option to Block Contacts but that is not quite the same as deleting them from Mail Contacts.

 

[spock999]

We are all different and have our own ways of operating. I struggle to understand why one would use Siri!!! Each to his own.

Earlier in the thread there is a tip for deleting previous recipients via the Mail menu Window > Previous Recipients.

 

[IWT]

What I would like is a way of deleting email addresses of previous recipients.

Hi Rod,

Unless I am misunderstanding you (of which I am quite often guilty), I explained a method of doing this in post #3 and 5.

In Mail > Window from top menu bar > Previous Recipients. This displays a list of all those who have sent you an email. Click to Highlight and Remove those you wish to eradicate.

Of course, you can delete email addresses and, indeed, all info from Contacts as well.

The two methods are complementary in that the Previous Recipients includes all received email addresses including those NOT in Contacts. But when you bring up a new email message, if an address is in Contacts, that will still show. So you need to delete these too.

Ian

 

[Lifeisabeach]

Hi,

I may be in a minority but I find Siri very intrusive and have always disabled it. I am operating on 10.14.6.

Recently I received a very dubious email which seemed to be mirroring a friends email address. It arrived in Junk (using Mail). I opened it but decided that it was too risky to click on the enclosed link and deleted it via Erase Junk mail.

OK, that got rid of it but a week or so later when I start to compose an email to that friend, the dubious email address was offered up as an option courtesy of Siri.

This is something that should never happen but especially so when I have supposedly disabled siri in Settings.

Is it possible to completely disable Siri so it doesn't do anything even in the background?

Thanks

Ok, so now that I'm on my Mac, I'm trying to experiment a bit and I'm missing something completely here. When I compose an email in Mail, when I first enter a letter in the "To" field, I get suggestions for people in my Contacts list and for addresses I have sent emails to previously. It doesn't offer to fill in email addresses from emails in my inbox or trash, and presumably wouldn't if in my spam folder. I also don't know why you think Siri is even involved... I don't get anything suggesting these are Siri suggestions. Now, in my Siri preferences, under Siri Suggestions & Privacy, I have the options for Mail disabled, so maybe that explains the difference, but re-enabling them has no effect. At least not yet. I also have Mail and Messages disabled in my Spotlight preferences, but again, re-enabling it there has no immediate effect.

You should check your Contacts to make sure that the spam email address didn't somehow get added to it.

 

[ferrarr]

You should check your Contacts to make sure that the spam email address didn't somehow get added to it.

There is an option in Contacts > Preferences to "Show Siri Suggestions".

 

[Rod]

Darn, I must have missed that entirely Ian.
spock999, that was my point, I don’t use Siri on macOS at all (I do in iOS and Apple Watch) but I do not find it intrusive in any way.