Have you encountered a puzzling situation where your Mac's identityservicesd is attempting to connect to servers in China, particularly under the hostname init.ess.apple.com? In this guide, we'll walk you through a potential solution to address this issue. Our goal is to provide a straightforward fix for users who find themselves puzzled by these unexpected connections to Chinese servers without any apparent reason.
The problem typically arises when users attempt to access iCloud services. Suddenly, they're prompted to input both their Mac password and Apple ID credentials. This issue seems to have surfaced after the installation of the latest macOS 17.1 update. Adding to the mystery, some of the associated IP addresses are linked to China Telecom or China Unicom. Here are the specific IP addresses in question:
112.240.57.248
113.5.170.192
124.239.244.193
218.60.20.177
61.161.1.46
While some users might find that their routers automatically block these connections to Chinese servers, not everyone is so fortunate. Consequently, many users are left in a state of concern, wondering whether their Mac or iCloud accounts have been compromised. To clarify, it's not a case of a "hack," but it's better to err on the side of caution and address this identityservicesd init.ess.apple.com issue involving Chinese servers once and for all. Join us on this journey to resolve it.
Resolving Connection Issues with identityservicesd init.ess.apple.com and Chinese Servers
If you're encountering the problem of identityservicesd attempting to establish connections with servers in China under the hostname init.ess.apple.com, you might be wondering how to address it. Here's a clear and straightforward solution for you, but please note that this fix involves disabling the identityservicesd, which is also used by FaceTime and iMessage. Proceed only if you're comfortable with this trade-off.
Follow these steps to disable identityservicesd:
- Open Launchpad and navigate to Others > Terminal.
- In the Terminal window, enter the following two commands and press Enter:
launchctl bootout gui/501/com.apple.identityservicesd
launchctl disable gui/501/com.apple.identityservicesdWith identityservicesd now disabled, it should no longer make outgoing connections to servers in China using the hostname init.ess.apple.com. It's worth mentioning that the official developers have not yet acknowledged this issue, nor have they provided an estimated time for a fix. Rest assured, we will update this guide as soon as there are any developments on this front. In the meantime, these workarounds should help you resolve the problem.