What stays on your Mac, and the only times FireAI goes online by itself

From the About window: “FireAI sends no telemetry. It only goes online on its own for what you turn on in Settings: updates, threat lists, company logos and the AI model.”

What stays on this Mac

• Your rules, your security mode and profiles, and your connection history, if you turn it on.
• Autopilot’s learning and habits, and its memory of your past decisions.
• The camera and microphone watch log.
• Anything FireAI inspects to protect you: it reads only the unencrypted start of a connection (a website name, or something sent in the clear) — it never installs a certificate to decrypt your traffic, and the content of an encrypted connection is never read.

The only times FireAI reaches the internet on its own

• Checking for app updates — once a day, or only when you ask, from Settings › FireAI updates. It asks for the latest version number and sends nothing about you or your connections.
• Threat lists (opt-in) — free public lists downloaded once a day; your traffic is never sent to them. If you add your own Google Safe Browsing key, only unknown or suspicious names are sent to Google, never all of your traffic. See threat lists for the full list of sources.
• Country database updates (opt-in) — once a month, authenticated with your licence key, with nothing about your connections included.
• Company logos (opt-in “Show Logos”) — fetches each company’s own icon from its own website; off by default, so FireAI shows coloured initials and makes no request until you turn it on.
• The on-device AI model (opt-in “Add AI”) — downloaded once from Hugging Face; after that, it runs only on this Mac.
• Confirming a licence — only once you enter one, sending the licence key itself and nothing about your connections.

If something goes wrong

If FireAI’s filter can’t load your rules, it allows traffic and shows an alert, rather than cutting your Mac off the network by mistake. The kill switch is the one deliberate “block everything” switch, and it’s always something you turn on yourself.