Why are Cryptexes appearing on Desktop and in Disk Utility

[david_blanchard]

Recently when I booted into my external backup drive I noted cryptexes mounted on the desktop. Then, today, the same thing on my internal boot drive. Opening Disk Utility showed about a dozen of these strange volumes/containers.

I rebooted into Recovery and ran Disk First Aid on all the containers, volumes. No errors were encountered and no First Aid was applied.

Another reboot from the internal drive and everything appears normal. (Oh, I really hope so!)

What the heck just happened?

Edit: macOS 15.7.3, M2 Mac Studio.

[tommy (Tommy Weir)]

This post by Oakley might clarify, looks like you checked mid some updates… maybe…

Cryptex: how a custom iPhone is changing macOS updates

[david_blanchard]

Thanks…I have already read Oakley’s many blog posts about cryptexes. He notes:

Because cryptexes aren’t mounted in the usual way, they’re not visible in mount lists such as that produced by mount(8).

But they did mount on the desktop and were also visible in Disk Utility.

[david_blanchard]

I asked Howard Oakley and he replied that it’s nothing to worry about.

It’s nothing to worry about, although you normally can’t do anything about them when they do appear. There’s no purpose to running First Aid, as the cryptexes are secure and checked on mounting. It’s just one of those temporary aberrations that does occur occasionally. But a boot or two later and they should vanish again.
Howard.

Weird and annoying but harmless.