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Deleted Contact Reappears in Sierra

Ambrosia7177

Ambrosia7177

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Feb 6, 2016
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My MBP has Sierra, and when I go to "Users & Groups" and choose Contact Card: Open it launches the "Contacts" application.

After doing this, I selected my Admin user which is the only user currently on my Mac and I right-clicked and choose "Delete Card" and it appears that my contact was deleted. However, when I go back to Contact Card: Open my contact reappears!

What is going on?
 
I have spent forever searching online and can't find any information out there that even describes this issue.

The only thing I can think is that I can't delete myself since I am the only user on my mac at this point. But then again, I'm not trying to delte my user account, I just want to delete the Contact Card for my Admin user. (And when I did this on my old Mac years ago, it worked the first time...)

Any ideas on this one? :(
 
BrianBaughn said:
If you don't have a card designated as "My Card" (called the "me card"), clicking on System Preferences>Users & Groups>Contacts Card: "Open" will create a new contact card and make it the "me card".

Additionally, this info is valid for Sierra: https://support.apple.com/guide/contacts/set-up-your-contact-card-adrb3525ca49
Click to expand...

My goal is to delete the card that macOS created for me. (I do not want any cards, other than the Apple one is okay.)

On Mountain Lion it was possible to delete the "me card". Has that changed in Sierra?

I want to "nuke" my Admin user's Contacts card!
 
BrianBaughn said:
Stop creating it as I described.
Click to expand...

Sorry but that doesn't make any sense.

You didn't describe anything about stopping to create whatever.

Let's rewind...

I am setting up a new Mac. And I have an admin account called "user2". I do NOT want a Contacts card, and I did NOT create one - apparently macOS did that for me.

I want to DELETE the "user2" Contacts card, and I am able to do that, but when I go back into Contacts it just reappears.

Sorry, but what you said in post #3 and the link doesn't seem to apply to what I'm asking for help with.
 
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BrianBaughn said:
I must be completely misunderstanding what you are doing. Hopefully, someone else can help.
Click to expand...

Thought I was pretty clear in my OP, but here goes again...

I am setting up a new MacBook Pro with Sierra. When I go to System Preferences > Users & Groups, there is a label that says "Contacts Card:" and an "Open" button. When I click on the "Open" button, the Contacts application launches and I see a pop-up screen listing "Apple, Inc." and "user2" as entries.If I click on "user2" and then right-click, there is an option to "Delete Card", so I chose that. "Are you sure you want to delete the card for "user2"? I choose "Delete". Now I don't see "user2" listed anymore.

However, if I quit out of the Contacts application, and then I start the same sequence over (i.e. click on "open" button) then I see "Apple, Inc." and "user2" listed again!

Even though "user2" has no contact info inside of it, I do not want my username listed in Contacts!

So why can't I permanently delete "user2" from the Contacts application and get on with setting up my Mac and with my life?!

:rolleyes:
 
I'm going to call a few of my associates and ask them if they've ever seen this behavior. If any of them have a suggestion as to how to help you I'll let you know.
 
BrianBaughn said:
I'm going to call a few of my associates and ask them if they've ever seen this behavior. If any of them have a suggestion as to how to help you I'll let you know.
Click to expand...

Thanks for trying to help!

As mentioned above, when I performed a similar sequence of events on my old MacBook Pro running Mountain Lion, when I deleted the admin (and only) user's "Contacts card" it went away for good.

Let's hope there isn't a software issue with my brand new MacBook Pro!
 
I'm going to take a -guess- (and it's nothing more than "a guess") that Contacts, as programmed by Apple, will always re-create a "card" for the account owner.

Delete it, and it may be -programmed- to "come right back".
I see no preference option regarding this one way or the other.

If you're that worried about it, call Apple tech support and see what they say.
 
Texas_Toast said:
Thanks for trying to help!

As mentioned above, when I performed a similar sequence of events on my old MacBook Pro running Mountain Lion, when I deleted the admin (and only) user's "Contacts card" it went away for good.

Let's hope there isn't a software issue with my brand new MacBook Pro!
Click to expand...

It will most likely be a software issue and it might something Apple has done on purpose.

What happens if you delete the contact.app ?
 
rhett7660 said:
It will most likely be a software issue and it might something Apple has done on purpose.

What happens if you delete the contact.app ?
Click to expand...

I haven't tried that yet. (Maybe that is too extreme even for me?)

Could this be an issue with a plist file or whatever they are called?

Since the Contacts card just has "user2", I guess it isn't the end of the world, but I'd feel better if I could delete it. As you can probably tell, i am always worried about computers tracking/logging/watching/tattling on me when I don't know it, and since I am anti-social and don't want to create contacts/friends/whatever in this context, I
d prefer being able to delete the Contacts card on my admin account! :cool:
 
Texas_Toast said:
I haven't tried that yet. (Maybe that is too extreme even for me?)

Could this be an issue with a plist file or whatever they are called?

Since the Contacts card just has "user2", I guess it isn't the end of the world, but I'd feel better if I could delete it. As you can probably tell, i am always worried about computers tracking/logging/watching/tattling on me when I don't know it, and since I am anti-social and don't want to create contacts/friends/whatever in this context, I
d prefer being able to delete the Contacts card on my admin account! :cool:
Click to expand...

Do you have contacts in the contacts app? If not, delete it. Maybe keep your contacts on a Rolodex or some other non-digital based system. Being serious.

Given how much you want to do away with your digital footprint, I see you are connecting to the internet still which is far worse than any OS system is reporting or spying on.
 
rhett7660 said:
Do you have contacts in the contacts app? If not, delete it. Maybe keep your contacts on a Rolodex or some other non-digital based system. Being serious.
Click to expand...

That is what I do currently - any contacts are on paper.


rhett7660 said:
Given how much you want to do away with your digital footprint, I see you are connecting to the internet still which is far worse than any OS system is reporting or spying on.
Click to expand...

It is a balancing act. Yes, I am well aware of all of the privacy threats out there, which is why I created this thread!

Just trying to learn as much as I can, and then taking reasonable steps so I can do a decent job of maintaining some privacy both online and off.

The Contacts cards probably aren't that big of a deal, other than if it exists I was afraid my mac might somehow tell the outside world the names of users (e.g. "user2") on my Mac, and then that would be a security risk.
 
You might want to do the following:

Keep this computer setup as is, but disable all access points into the machine such as wifi and network cable. Have it sit as a stand alone device. Then if you want to get online, you keep another computer handy that has absolutely no other pieces of software or pieces of your personnel life on. This way, you have the best of "both" worlds. A fully functional computer which is not sending "any" information to anyone. And one that is connected but has absolutely no personal information on it.

It would be a pain to go back and forth, but this way you are 100% safe with any and all info on your primary machine due to it not being connected at all.
 
rhett7660 said:
You might want to do the following:

Keep this computer setup as is, but disable all access points into the machine such as wifi and network cable. Have it sit as a stand alone device. Then if you want to get online, you keep another computer handy that has absolutely no other pieces of software or pieces of your personnel life on. This way, you have the best of "both" worlds. A fully functional computer which is not sending "any" information to anyone. And one that is connected but has absolutely no personal information on it.

It would be a pain to go back and forth, but this way you are 100% safe with any and all info on your primary machine due to it not being connected at all.
Click to expand...

That is a great suggestion, and I sorta do that now, except I don't have an offline computer.

But I am planning on using my new MBP for business and this old one more for surfing.

It looks like the folks in Cupertino want me to have at least one Contacts card.

Hopefully it can't get hacked or somehow send out other info abut me or my computer like how Spotlight does...
 
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