Release Notes

This beta version of Little Snitch requires a valid license key. Licenses that were purchased after November 1, 2019, can already be used to register Little Snitch 5.

If you don’t yet have a license you can use the following time limited demo key that expires on November 5, 2020:

35RJ4T5GE0-GP10N0W5PP-LUK3L8RMHK

Improvements and new features

• Lots of user interface refinements to match the new look of macOS Big Sur.
• Rules can now be created for a list of port ranges, not just a single range.
• Added command line interface for accessing connection history and traffic log data.
• The traffic diagram in Network monitor can now display traffic data from up to one year (compared to the previous 1 hour).
• The menu for selecting the time period that’s displayed by Network Monitor has been moved from the Filter menu in the search field to View menu in the menu bar.
• Various performance improvements.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed a bug where a connection alert would not go away after clicking allow or deny.
• Fixed various crashes of Network Monitor.
• Fixed a bug where Little Snitch complained about a code modification although the process was not modified.
• Reduced the number of cases where connection alerts for Internet addresses instead of server names were shown.
• Lots of other minor bug fixes.

• Improved notification handling. All notifications are now generated by one single component (the “Little Snitch Agent”), which reduces the number of alerts shown by macOS for allowing the display of these notifications.
• Code identity checks now provide information about a developer’s name, and not just the developer’s team identifier.
• Improved information shown when the code signature of a process became invalid because a library with missing code signature was loaded.
• Improved debug logging. Little Snitch no longer writes log messages to individual log files but uses the logging facilities of macOS.
• Added a command line API for accessing log messages related to Little Snitch.
• Removed menu items responsible for Network Monitor snapshots because snapshots are no longer available.
• Fixed possible crashes when importing backups.
• Various bug fixes and improvements.

• This release brings back “Automatic Profile Switching”. Profiles can now be automatically activated when a network is joined.
• Little Snitch is now scriptable. The app package contains a command line utility at Contents/Components/littlesnitch which can be used to control Little Snitch from scripts or via Terminal. Scriptability must be enabled in Little Snitch’s Security Preferences.
• Improved detection of a remote computer’s domain name for connection alerts and for display in Network Monitor.
• The debug interface for activation and deactivation of components is now password protected.
• Various bug fixes and improvements.

This is a hotfix for a bug in macOS Big Sur Beta 5! Please install this version before upgrading to Beta 5! Otherwise you won’t be able to boot your computer!

This version does not install an Endpoint Security System Extension because Big Sur Beta 5 suffers a kernel panic immediately after booting this System Extension is installed. During upgrade, an existing Endpoint Security System Extension is removed. Currently, the only function of the Endpoint Security System Extension is to detect access to Berkeley Packet Filter devices. This version can therefore not warn when a process tries to access the Berkeley Packet Filter.

The good news is that Big Sur Beta 5 fixes an other kernel panic which occurred on some computers when Little Snitch’s Network Extension was installed.

• Re-implemented process identity checks.
• Re-implemented creation of Diagnostics Reports.
• Various improvements and bug fixes in the user interface.

• This version is now a Universal Binary which runs on both Intel and Apple Silicon Macs.
• Import of rules and settings from previous versions. Choose Little Snitch > File > Restore from Backup… and select a previously created backup file or /Library/Application Support/Objective Development/Little Snitch/configuration4.xpl to import rules and settings from Little Snitch 4. This also works with configurations and backups from Little Snitch 3.
• Export of rules and settings in JSON format. Choose Little Snitch > File > Create Backup…
• Various improvements and bug fixes in the user interface.

• Improved upgrade procedure to work around an issue where macOS sometimes fails to start the newly installed network extension. If this problem occurs, the installer now completely uninstalls the previously installed extension before retrying to install the new one.
• If a previous, incompatible version of Little Snitch is found, this version is now uninstalled automatically in the course of installing the new version. This uninstallation may require a restart of the computer in order to let macOS complete the removal of the kernel extension.
• Several user interface refinements in the rules window.
• Little Snitch now correctly identifies connections that were established by a Java process or a shell script.

This version is primarily a test of the automatic software update. Please install this version using the automatic software update mechanism, not manually.

Installation

If you install this Technology Preview for the first time, please read the installation hints in the release notes of build 6104 below.

Changes

• Redesigned Rules window title bar.
• Little Snitch specific log files are now created in a dedicated Library/Logs/Little Snitch subdirectory.

This Technology Preview of Little Snitch is not yet feature complete. There are several known limitations you should be aware of before you install:

Installation

During the installation you will be asked to enable system extensions in System Preferences > Security & Privacy. After clicking on “Open Security Preferences”, the same dialog will appear once again. This is a bug in macOS Big Sur.

After clicking on “Allow…” in System Preferences > Security & Privacy, you will see a confirmation dialog containing two entries labeled “Placeholder Developer”. These incorrect labels are a bug in macOS Big Sur. The checkboxes for both of these entries must be checked.

Known Limitations

• Rules and settings from previous versions of Little Snitch are not yet imported. Little Snitch will therefore start with the default factory rule set.
• Backup and restore of rules and settings is not yet implemented.
• Code identity checks (usually based on code signature) are not yet implemented.
• Automatic Profile Switching is not yet implemented.
• Some UI components don’t yet have their final appearance and layout.

Tips and Tricks

• All data files are encrypted with a password which is stored in the System Keychain (“Little Snitch Encryption Key”). When you make a backup of the files in /Library/Application Support/Objective Development/Little Snitch/, make sure you also backup this password.
• Traffic history is now recorded by a background process, even when Network Monitor is not running.

Feedback

If Little Snitch crashes or behaves in an unexpected way, please contact our support using the “Send Feedback” button above.

Make sure to include the following information:

• Version number of your Little Snitch app.
• A textual description of the issue: What did you do, what would you have expected to happen and what did happen.
• Crash logs of Little Snitch components, which can be found in Console.app sidebar under “Crash Reports”.
• Logs from Little Snitch under /Library/Logs/ and ~/Library/Logs/.
• Screen shots which describe the issue (if applicable).