Monterey Mail.app: "Your network preferences prevent content from loading privately."

[SW3029]

I've got "Protect Mail Activity" checked in Mail.app, but when I receive emails, images don't show and I get this banner at the top of the email: "Your network preferences prevent content from loading privately." along with a button I need to press called "Load Content Directly" which I need to press in order for email images to load.

I have a VPN, but it is never running. What other network preference could prevent the content from loading?

 

[jrodmonaco]

Same happens on my iPhone. Wondering if this is a Mail setting/issue.

 

[denleschae]

I'm getting the same message in Mail. I have to disable both Protect Mail Activity and Hide IP Address in settings in order to get images to load. Also, I am not using iCloud Private Relay on the Mac. If I enable my encrypt.me VPN with these settings enabled images can load.

The odd thing is that for my iPhone and iPad (wifi) I have Protect Mail Activity plus iCloud Private Relay enabled and Mail images load fine. All devices are using the same wireless network.

 

[Aggedor]

Same problem here. No VPN. I have Protect Mail Activity enabled.

In my Apple ID settings, there is Private Relay (beta) listed, with an Upgrade button, but if I click that it just takes me to a page to choose an iCloud+ payment plan.

 

[GlenK]

Have the same issue. Any ideas on correction or are people just leaving it. I don't really want to unprotect mail activity, I like this feature.

 

[Aggedor]

Have the same issue. Any ideas on correction or are people just leaving it. I don't really want to unprotect mail activity, I like this feature.

At the moment, I'm still pressing the button. I use both an iCloud account and a Gmail account in Mail, as far as I've noticed, the button is always on Gmail emails. But that could just be because I haven't yet received an iCloud mail the requires remote content.

 

[GlenK]

Think I stumbled on how to fix it. Go to Settings > WiFi > your WiFi network, tap on the i (info Button), then make sure iCloud Private Relay is turned on:

This corrected it for me and mail messages are loading properly now.

 

[TEK Rider]

In my case it happens when AVG Antivirus is running...soon as I disconnected AVG; Quit and Relaunched Mail boom it works ...so next thing how to keep Antivirus and the ability to load images privately. ?

 

[Aggedor]

Think I stumbled on how to fix it. Go to Settings > WiFi > your WiFi network, tap on the i (info Button), then make sure iCloud Private Relay is turned on:

This corrected it for me and mail messages are loading properly now.

Isn't that on an iPhone? This thread is about the problem in Monterey.

 

[GlenK]

^^Yes, but the same setting is on WiFi in Monterey.

 

[Steve28]

^^Yes, but the same setting is on WiFi in Monterey.

EDITL never mind - found it, but I still have the problem. I have it enabled in iCloud, enabled in my wifi settings, and it's still giving me the message in Mail about my network settings preventing images from being loaded

 

[SW3029]

EDITL never mind - found it, but I still have the problem. I have it enabled in iCloud, enabled in my wifi settings, and it's still giving me the message in Mail about my network settings preventing images from being loaded

Same. It works flawlessly on iPhone, but in Monterey I can't get the images to load. Tried everything.

 

[Aggedor]

Yeah same here - enabled in Monterey, didn't make a difference.

 

[GlenK]

That's weird, enabling it in both worked on mine.

 

[batsabode]

That's weird, enabling it in both worked on mine.

Having the same problem I do have private VPN but its not active and yet I tried the suggestion and its not helping.

 

[RChiew]

I have had this same issue in the Mail app, since upgrading to Monterey. I fixed it by going into Mail/Preferences and Privacy and disabling all tick boxes. Restarting the Mail app and fixed it.

 

[SlowButEffectiv]

That's weird, enabling it in both worked on mine.

When you say it worked, is that on your iPhone or on Monterey? It's not working for me on Monterey either.

 

[Aggedor]

I have had this same issue in the Mail app, since upgrading to Monterey. I fixed it by going into Mail/Preferences and Privacy and disabling all tick boxes. Restarting the Mail app and fixed it.

Yeah but the whole point is that we WANT the privacy features.

 

[GlenK]

When you say it worked, is that on your iPhone or on Monterey? It's not working for me on Monterey either.

It worked for both. I no longer get that message and messages load completely in both.

 

[Steve28]

For me it works fine on all of my iDevices, but not my MacBook - not matter what I toggle/set/etc. And they are all on the same wifi network, so it can't be my router/dns/etc

 

[Aggedor]

Time to submit a bug to Apple? Not sure this is working as intended

 

[Steve_W]

I got on with Apple Support today and what fixed it for me was to turn off "Hide IP address" under Privacy in Email Preferences.

 

[SW3029]

I got on with Apple Support today and what fixed it for me was to turn off "Hide IP address" under Privacy in Email Preferences.

View attachment 1883570

But when you then tick "Protect Mail Activity" the "Hide IP Address" just gets ticked again too.

The issue is we WANT "Protect Mail Activity" so we can privately load the images in an email.

 

[Wizec]

I’ve found that having Pi-Hole enabled causes this issue.

If I disable it the problem goes away.

 

[Aggedor]

But when you then tick "Protect Mail Activity" the "Hide IP Address" just gets ticked again too.

The issue is we WANT "Protect Mail Activity" so we can privately load the images in an email.

Yeah, this is the exacct issue. We want these new mail privacy features that Monterey introduced. My wife's M1 MBA, also updated to Monterey, does not have this issue with Mail, and the settings are identical to my MBA.

So... it MUST be a bug.