Managed preferences

Outbound reads one managed-preference domain, com.outboundfirewall.outbound. An administrator forces keys in it with a configuration profile (payload type com.apple.ManagedClient.preferences); the sample profile on the IT page shows the layout, with the keys inside the forced mcx_preference_settings dictionary.

Only forced keys count

A key only has an effect when the profile forces it. The app checks each key with objectIsForced, so the same key written as an ordinary user default (written by a script, defaults write, or a user) does nothing. This keeps a managed Mac managed: a value someone sets in their own preferences is never mistaken for the administrator’s.

Most forced keys with the wrong value type are ignored, and the stored setting stays in force. Invalid rule-feed settings instead stop feed updates and report a configuration error. The approval controls fail closed: an invalid ApprovalAuthority counts as none, an invalid SettingsLocked as true, and an invalid PauseAllowed, NetworkRescueAllowed or UninstallAllowed as false. Integers outside their range are clamped. For Mode, a value that is not one of the three mode names is ignored the same way. Nothing crashes and nothing falls back to a guessed default.

The app reads the forced keys at launch and observes the domain for changes, so editing the profile takes effect without a restart of the Mac. The background agent, which draws the menu bar item and runs the feed and audit export, reads the same forced values. The network filter reads them itself too, and it is the filter that sends audit lines to a SIEM.

The keys

Key	Type	What it does
LicenseKey	String	Licenses the Mac with this key, without a prompt. Settings › License then reads “This license is managed by your organization.”, Use a Different Key and Deactivate are hidden, and outboundctl refuses activation.
LicenseDeviceName	String	Optional name for this Mac’s licence activation.
Mode	String	Forces the operation mode: alert (Ask), silentAllow (Learn) or silentDeny (Strict). See Operation modes.
ManagedRulesOverride	Boolean	When true, managed rules from the feed take precedence over every other rule except priority rules. See Rules.
UsersMayEditRules	Boolean	When false, rule editing is locked: the app shows “Managed by your organization” and outboundctl refuses changes with exit status 77. See Locking settings.
DisableAlerts	Boolean	When true, no alert appears. An ask verdict is resolved without asking: denied in Strict mode, allowed otherwise.
TelemetryBlockCategories	Array of strings	Forces “Block known telemetry” on with exactly these categories, or off for an empty array. See below.
RuleFeedURL	String	HTTPS address of the managed rule feed. See Managed rule feed.
RuleFeedPinnedSHA256	String	Optional. 64 hexadecimal digits; the feed is refused unless its exact bytes have this SHA-256.
AuditExportPath	String	Absolute path of the directory that receives a copy of the audit log. ~ is expanded. See Audit log export.
ApprovalAuthority	String	Who may approve loosening protection: user, administrator or none.
SettingsLocked	Boolean	When true, the settings lock stays on and cannot be turned off on the Mac.
PauseAllowed	Boolean	When false, pausing is refused, even with an administrator’s approval.
NetworkRescueAllowed	Boolean	When false, network rescue and turning the filter off are refused.
UninstallAllowed	Boolean	When false, Outbound cannot be removed on the Mac.
RuleFeedPublicKeys	Array of strings	Base64 Ed25519 public keys. When set, every rule feed must be signed by one of them.
RuleFeedAllowRollback	Boolean	When true, outboundctl feed rollback may reinstall a kept feed.
RuleFeedAllowedRedirectHosts	Array of strings	Extra hosts a rule-feed or blocklist download may be redirected to.
DeviceGroups	Array of strings	Groups this Mac belongs to, matched against a feed’s targets.
TimeoutAction	String	allow or deny for an alert nobody answers.
AppAbsentAction	String	allow or deny while the background agent is absent.
AlertTimeoutSeconds	Integer, 5 to 300	How long a TCP alert waits.
AllowQuitAgent	Boolean	When false, the background agent cannot be quit.
UpdatesEnabled	Boolean	When false, app updates are off.
UpdateChannel	String	stable or beta.
UpdateDeferralDays	Integer, 0 to 90	Holds back new updates by this many days.
AIAssistantEnabled	Boolean	When false, the Assistant and cloud AI are off.
AIAllowedProviders	Array of strings	Cloud AI provider IDs allowed; on-device AI stays allowed.
MCPServerEnabled	Boolean	When false, the MCP server cannot run or be installed.
CodingAgentIntegrationEnabled	Boolean	When false, coding agents cannot connect over ACP.
CLIChanges	String	Command-line changes: allow (tightening), ask (every change) or off.
CLIChangesAllowed	Boolean	Deprecated: use CLIChanges. Read for one release; true means allow, false means off.
Blocklists	Array of strings	Catalogue IDs that must stay subscribed.
HistoryEnabled	Boolean	When false, connection history is not recorded; rollups are unaffected.
HistoryRetentionDays	Integer, 1 to 400	Days of connection history to keep.
EncryptedDNS	String	Forces the DNS provider: quad9, cloudflare, google, nextDNS (or nextdns), dns4eu, controld or custom. dns4eu selects DNS4EU Protective; controld selects Control D Unfiltered. An unknown value is ignored.
AuditRemoteDetail	String	Remote detail in audit lines and exports: full, domain or hashed.
AuditHostIdentifier	String	Host field in the sealed log: computerName or serialHash.
AuditRetentionDays	Integer, 1 to 400	Days the sealed audit log is kept (30 when not forced).
AuditFormat	String	Format for audit sinks: jsonl, cef, leef or ecs.
AuditSyslogURL	String	Syslog server, syslog+tls://host:port.
AuditSyslogPinnedSHA256	String	SHA-256 of the syslog server’s certificate; delivery stops on a mismatch.
AuditHTTPURL	String	HTTPS endpoint for an HTTP audit sink.
AuditHTTPKind	String	hec (Splunk), elastic (bulk) or generic JSON.
AuditHTTPTokenKeychainLabel	String	System keychain service that holds the HTTP sink’s token.
AuditHTTPTokenFile	String	Absolute path to a root-owned token file, mode 0600 or 0400, at most 8 KiB.
AuditUnifiedLog	Boolean	When true, redacted audit lines also go to the unified log.
AuditSpoolMegabytes	Integer, 1 to 2048	Most data each audit sink queues, in MiB (default 256).
OutboundTelemetryEnabled	Boolean	Forces anonymous product telemetry on or off.

Mode

Mode accepts the three mode names the app stores internally: alert, silentAllow and silentDeny. When the key is forced:

• The mode picker in the Firewall menu, the menu bar panel and the main window is disabled.
• The app explains why: “Your organization sets the mode” in the menu bar panel, “Your organization manages the mode on this Mac.” in the main window.
• outboundctl prefs set mode refuses with “mode is set by your organization and cannot be changed from outboundctl.”

A Mode of any other value, or a value that is not a string at all, is ignored and the user’s own choice stays in force.

DisableAlerts

With DisableAlerts forced true, connections that would ask are decided without an alert, in the filter itself. An ask verdict becomes deny in Strict mode and allow in Ask and Learn. The decision still appears in the Network Monitor and the audit log. outboundctl prefs set disable-alerts refuses while the key is forced.

TelemetryBlockCategories

This key forces the “Block known telemetry” switch on the Telemetry settings page. The value is an array of category names:

• analytics, crash-reporting, logging, feature-flags, advertising, attribution, session-replay
• An empty array forces the switch off.
• Names this build does not know are ignored. Only forced arrays count; any other type is ignored.

The switch and the category toggles are then disabled in Settings, with a “Managed by your organisation” note. Apps a person turned telemetry off for stay off: the key does not touch per-app opt-outs. The rules appear in the Rules pane as one rule group named “Known telemetry”.

Rule feed and audit export

RuleFeedURL and RuleFeedPinnedSHA256 drive the managed rule feed; AuditExportPath drives the audit export. Both are read by the background agent, and both fail safe: a feed address that is not HTTPS, or a pin that is not 64 hexadecimal digits, is reported as a configuration problem in Settings rather than silently ignored. An unusable pin never means “no pin”.

Reading the values yourself

• outboundctl prefs list and outboundctl prefs get <key> print the effective values, that is, your stored settings with every forced key laid over them. A forced Mode or DisableAlerts is visible there.
• outboundctl prefs set refuses the two keys it can be overridden by (mode, disable-alerts) while they are forced. Other forced keys do not block prefs set, but a change that would loosen protection is refused in any case and must be approved in the app.

Note

The managed preferences domain is separate from the app’s own settings file. Your choices live in settings.json next to the rules file; managed keys are never written there. See The rules file format.