How do I turn off connection suggestions?

Managing data use w/ OS X 10.10.2 on a metered connection?

• My father's Macbook Pro is consuming bandwidth at a prodigious rate, and he's on a metered data connection (10gb/month 4g data). What should I be sure to disable so he can control when the system wants to run updates? List of what I've already tried inside. My dad has a 2008 MBP. Since I gave it to him in 2012, he's been using it without problems on his metered connection. However, back at Christmas I updated him to OS X 10.10.2. I also suggested he try running Chrome, since Firefox was not handling the memory-constrained environment (2gb RAM, which he's now upgraded to 4gb). Starting midway through April, the system downloaded several large things without asking first, and he's hit overage charges on his connection -- he actually had to turn off his access point entirely for a few days last month, and now that he's turned it back on, he's seeing more unwanted use. I've advised him to run Activity Monitor and keep an eye on download use. Right now the offending process seems to be nsurlsessiond, which is OS X's download management library, used by just about everything, it seems like. This morning while on the phone with me, he enabled wifi and almost immediately nsurlsessiond downloaded ~1gb! I had him disable wifi and drive to a public wifi hotspot, where I did some remote support via TeamViewer. Before this morning, I had already set the App Store to never download w/o user action. Today I disabled iCloud entirely, disabled Spotlight 'bing search,' and 'spotlight suggestions,' and disabled Chrome auto updates (but created a desktop shortcut he can run when he's on public wifi). I've also shown him how to run Activity Monitor to manage network traffic. I asked him to $ sudo lsof -i and paste the results to me in an email, if the unwanted data use reoccurs while he's watching -- hopefully whatever nsurlsessiond is connecting to will give me a clue. I've advised him to keep his wifi off while he's not actively browsing, too. For the record, my dad's pretty tech-savvy -- he was a Novell CNE in the 90s, before he retired -- but not really up to speed with TCP/IP or modern unix-like OSes. He can't change to an unmetered connection because 4G data is the only thing aside from dialup available where he lives -- no cable down his street, and too far from the CO for DSL. Satellite isn't an option because of both caps and latency. We're looking for ways to manage unwanted downloads so he can get the most out of his 4G modem. He also has an iPad and an iPhone 6 connected to the modem's wifi, but we're pretty sure the computer is at fault -- big downloads occurred while he inadvertently left the machine on while on an overnight trip away from his home with both other devices.

• Answer:

  He also has an iPad and an iPhone 6 connected to the modem's wifi, but we're pretty sure the computer is at fault I'd just do http://www.clifftam.com/it-guide-use-less-internet-bandwidth-for-iphones-and-ipads/ on those things also, there may be some weird way they are interacting with the desktop machine/internet if they're doing wireless sync stuff. I feel like turning off iCloud is going to nail this (I can't think of anything else that would do updates approaching that magnitude), but if not. So you've got the app store sorted. How about things like - Adobe Flash and any other software with an updater that doesn't go through the app store - Other browsers which may be downloading updates even if they're not the one's he's using (and all the related add-ons for example. Firefox can check that.) - Antivirus stuff that would download update packages - Itunes - any checking stuff it does (genius, covers, etc) I haven't used the new Photos app but if he has that make sure it's not adding locations to some idiot online map or otherwise tying to sync to some cloud thing. Otherwise I'd dive into the forums, the people there are pretty helpful and might be able to help you untangle this or think of things you haven't before. https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6605949 including a script that will kill nsurlsessiond until the next reboot.