First released and announced at WWDC 2019, Catalina is the new beast in Apple’s operating system collection. macOS Catalina was developed and designed for desktops and computers.
Catalina is the first operating system from apple’s factory to support only 64-bit applications and the first to include Activation Lock.
There are lot of changes Apple has made in this new operating system. Apart from that Apple has included some cool and new features which make the operating system different from its ancestors.
With the introduction of the new operating system, Apple has confirmed some new and unmatched security features which made the operating system so much out of the box. And that is what we are going to discuss today.
In this topic, as per the name of the topic suggests we will be focusing on the new security features offered by Catalina operating system and how they work in the real world.
But before going right into the main discussion I think I should give you a prior knowledge about Catalina operating system.
Catalina- the new beast in town
Just like I have mentioned before, Catalina was introduced in the year 2019 at WWD. Developed by Apple Inc., Catalina is the new member of the Macintosh-Unix operating system family.
The operating system was designed to play on both the x86 and x64 architecture platform. In this operating system, apple made many changes both in features and in performance. Apart from all these Catalina has some new top-notch security and privacy features.
You can say that this is the most focused thing of the Catalina operating system.
All new macOS Catalina security and privacy feature- working explained
Now that you know what is the new macOS Catalina and what are new features that Apple has added to this operating system, so we can move on to our main discussion of today.
In this section, I will tell you what are the new security and privacy features of the Catalina operating system are and how exactly they work.
Improved Data Protection
You can say this is the most attractive feature of the Catalina operating system. In the Catalina operating system if you want to install an application then the application has to go through a lot of steps and hoops.
This OS will ask for more authentication and permission before trying to install a third party application into your system. There is one more thing that apple added to this macOS is that now the operating system is now stored in a separate disk volume.
That means a complete isolated space for the operating system itself. This will help you to allocate your memory space better on your personal computer.
Weak Password Warning
Passwords are the most common and most reliable authentication procedure of any device. From the very beginning, Safari(the macOS browser) has provided better password security.
But in the new Catalina operating system, you have to input a strong password combination in a site otherwise the desktop will give you some warnings. So when this happens the operating system will direct you back to the sign-in page and will demand a better strong password.
Therefore, this is a great way to create strong authentication security system. Now if you want to see your saved passwords on your Safari and identify the weaker password you have saved before, you need to follow the below steps;
Open the Safari application
Go to the section saying, “preferences”.
In the section choose Passwords.
From here you can change or modify any password that you have saved on your Safari browser.
Block sender in Mail
Every day we receive numerous unwanted emails from different senders. These mails mean nothing to us and just cover up our inbox space. But with the new Catalina operating system, Apple has provided a solution to this problem.
In the new Catalina OS, you can block the sender. From the email, box opens an email. In that email, you will see the right arrow. Click that arrow to find the Block Contact option. So now if you have blocked the sender then in future you won’t receive any emails from that sender.
Now if you want to see your blocked senders list and want to unblock a few senders. Then just open your email and go to the preference section. There you will find a section saying, “Junk Mail” and here you find the Blocked option.
Another advantage is that you can manually add email addresses to your blocked list.
The Gatekeeper technology
This is the biggest under the hood security release of the Catalina operating system is the Gatekeeper technique. The Gatekeeper is the part of the operating system which in charge of keeping all the viruses and malware away from your system
With the introduction of the Gatekeeper now it is more difficult for the malware to intrude your system. This security feature scans every third party application or software before you install it on your computer.
Now codes from each of these apps must be sent to the Apple by the developers to check for any kind of malware and viruses.
Find My Smarts
Apple included this Find My feature along time ago on iOS 13 and iPad. But this time with the new Catalina operating system, the Find My feature got a new update.
With the help of this application you can track your device anywhere it goes. And not only that you can also locate your friends and family with the help of this feature.
This feature of the Apple operating system works best in case of lost and theivery. So you will be relieved to know this that in case of lost and theivery, Find My feature can track your device on the map even your device is not connected to any internet connection.
The feature uses the low-Bluetooth signals of your lost device to track it anywhere in the world (in offline mode also).
Some Final Thoughts
Though there are still many more security features that Apple has introduced in the latest Catalina operating system. In the above list, I have listed down some of the major security features of the Catalina macOS.
I hope that this article will help those readers who were about to change their operating system and shift to Catalina macOS. The above-listed security features are quite impressive and can help you to protect your system from various intruder actions.