Inc. columnist says Meta's Muse synced his texts to row 187,462 with Full Disk Access off

Andy Stone, Meta's head of communications, posted the company's version on X on Sept. 30: "Let's set the record straight: the Messages integration in the Muse app for Mac is entirely opt-in. You have to enable both Full Disk Access and the Messages connector for Muse to be able to read your Messages content." ^[1] He went on: "It can't read your Messages unless you do this. And it can be revoked at any time." ^[2] Full Disk Access is the setting in Apple's Mac software that lets an app read files anywhere on the computer. The connector is Muse's own switch ^[8]. Singleton said macOS protections cannot be bypassed even if the Muse app had a bug ^[5]. Meta's case depends on that operating-system gate holding. Aten's account only works if it failed.

The two accounts leave about three outcomes. In the first, Aten's machine had the access granted in some form his settings screen did not show. Meta would then be right about the gate and wrong only about what its agent told him. In the second, the Messages file can be reached some other way. Singleton's claim about macOS would then be wrong, and the problem would reach Apple's permission system as well as Meta's app. In the third, nobody shows which it was, and users are left with the vendor's word against one columnist's screen. Meta's reported response so far is statements from Stone and Singleton ^[1][4]. The report does not describe a log or a test result from Aten's Mac.

The money is in what the agent can reach. Muse launched on Sept. 8 and passed 2.5 million downloads by Sept. 23 ^[6]. That is about 167,000 a day over 15 days ^[11]. Meta pitches it as software that acts for you, sending an email or booking travel ^[7], and every one of those actions needs access to something. Amazon started blocking it 13 days after launch ^[12]. Meta says Muse has no visibility into passwords or payment methods ^[19].

I think the cost falls on Meta, and it comes back with every connector the company ships. Each integration asks users to accept Meta's description of a toggle. In the Messages case on record, that description and the user's screen disagree ^[1][13]. The counter-case is strong, and a test can settle it. Singleton's claim about macOS ^[5] is the kind of statement one test can settle. I would drop this view if a Mac with Full Disk Access off is shown to keep Muse out of the Messages database. The episode would then come down to a user who misread a setting and an agent that gave a wrong answer about itself ^[4].